Heading home tonight I got off the tram to buy some groceries then went back out to the tram stop to wait for another tram to complete my journey. As I waited I watched as a woman came back to her car to discover she had a parking ticket for parking in a 4pm-6pm clearway. I was rather pleased with this since I don’t see why people insist on stopping in the clearway “just for a minute” to go do some shopping / pick someone up / go to the ATM and cause a bottleneck for the entire peak hour northbound traffic. Most frustrating so it was nice to see someone getting a traffic infringement notice.

The driver looked quite irate at receiving the ticket and, evidently figuring that the day could not get much worse, decided to light up a cigarette and have a smoke instead of driving off and clearing the road. Cars were honking their horns at her as they approached her vehicle because she was presenting herself as a target - not only blocking the clearway but casually leaning against her car whilst she inconvenienced others. This made many drivers (and myself) rather frustrated so I decided a little karma was called for. At the end of her cigarette she inadvertently made her day worse (and my day better) by dropping the cigarette butt onto the footpath, stomping it out and getting into the car and driving away.

It was a simple matter to record the necessary car registration details and then lodge a report to the EPA litter line for her actions when I got home. Given the fine for the depositing a cigarette butt on the ground before getting into a car is more than $200 and the parking ticket would be closer to $120, she’d have been much better off driving away sooner and not blocking the clearway.

Yes, I am a rotten sod…

Categories: SPOTD