Parking 101

That is double yellow lines along the edge of the road. As in photo of illegally parked car here.
It is quite common to have different restrictions on the two sides of the road, for example double yellow on one side but time limited parking on the other, where the road is not wide enough to allow parking on both sides. And the lines do sometimes get a bit worn.

Parking in the UK is easy when we know what we are doing, and know how to read symbols. I mean how hard can counting the number and colour of lines, and then checking to see if there are kerb markings, to say nothing of zig zags or hatching, with few printed signs, be anyway?

Somewhere like the US where there is no writing on the road and everything is on signs.... hmmmm.

Noting Chris F's comments

an example is Sheep Street in Stratford upon Avon. Parking on both sides with room for traffic. The same council.

One side (east side) have to pay almost all the time. The other side, lots of periods of free parking. Many times I've sidled into a free bay, or along the single yellow line, to look across the street and see several cars which were parked by people thinking they were doing the right thing with yellow Penalty Charge Notices (tickets) stuck to the windscreen.

Chris and Nigel I agree with both of what you have written. For any person who has learnt to drive in the UK the markings are 'obvious', our two North Americans had no idea of what the yellow lines meant, nor what the 'No Waiting' bit on the sign meant. I do find it a bit funny that guidebooks tell you how to drive, motorways XX mph/km/h, but not how to park!

I would have thought that the "Canadians" would have been mildly curious as to the significance of the bright yellow double lines and asked a passerby. No language problem to excuse them. Just plain dopiness.

Norma, I think we were the passers by. After about 10 metres I think I went 'they are on double yellows'.

My feeling was they were one the first few days of travel, and had not done the '2+2= 4ish' equation about why there was a space where they parked. After my intervention they moved about 10 - 20 metres to a legal space.

It was not, in my opinion, doppiness, it was innocence. But Police Scotland would not have taken that into account.

Sometimes innocence is the same as dopiness.

hi Norma. I am not sure how long they had been here, but they had no idea what double yellows meant. To a UK driver they are obvious, drummed into us since childhood, but to a foreigner it is not clear.

As for them being Canadian, well that is me. North Americans are a) Canadian, b) New Englanders or New Yorkers or c) Texans.

It makes it easier. Just don't ask me to draw a map.

MC,

I am laughing out loud at your last comment. I don't feel nearly so bad now about being confused by the whole of Great Britain. I know where London is... sort of. ;)

Celeste in Atlanta, Georgia, USA - nowhere near New England, Texas or Canada.

We in the states are also used to having an unloading zone in front of a hotel. They probably assumed they were not going to park there, just unload the luggage, check in, and find out where to park. If I'm in a large city, I might look closely for signs, or look for a doorman to ask. But a small hotel on an island? I probably would have just parked. And hoped for a kind stranger to set me straight.

From the heartland in the Midwest, somewhere between Texas and New York.

A rule of thumb I find very helpful re parking: if you see lots of spaces on a street, it probably doesn't mean it's your lucky day. More likely it means that there's a reason knowledgeable locals haven't parked there - - street sweeping, rush hour towaway zone, etc. Especially in foreign countries, scrutinize all signs very carefully. It helps to keep a chart in the car for deciphering the various symbols.

How to really confuse the driving tourist is the Green ways,we have quite a few of them in the Edinburgh area .No stopping /parking at anytime but instead of double yellow lines we have Double RED lines, yep the greenways have red lines but generally the road do have a green surface but is very patchy as it wears out and is seldom replaced.Now don't get me started on Bus Lanes, some apply from 7.30am - 6.30 pm and some 7.30 -9.30 am the from 4.00- 6.30pm and it is often hard to tell.
Now we have parking in the city ,some places it is a maximum of one hour ,some 2 hours some 4 hours and some all day, price vary from area to are and then you have resident parking areas that non residents can use outwith the main parking times.Supermarkets and fast food restaurants have Number plate recognition cameras and you can be "fined" for overstaying in these times vary from 1-3 hours.
confused,yeah I thought so.I gave up my car 10 years ago as I really don't need it in Edinburgh as I can walk to work and have a very good bus service for getting around the city.When I need a car I rent one.

Somewhere like the US where there is no writing on the road and everything is on signs.... hmmmm.

Uniform national traffic marking system for the country, and the Northeast-Midwest-Intermountain West gets enough snow that it can take a couple of hours or more to get main roadways plowed enough so you can see any underlying paint jobs.

The city I grew up in had a fairly complex winter on-street parking code involving being banned from parking on the north-south side of east-west running streets (or east-west sides of north-south running streets) on odd-even numbered days in order to come up with a successful plan grid for snow plowing that was as efficient and cost-effective as possible.

Which was pretty clearly explained on signs above the streets subject to winter parking restrictions.