Simply follow The Golden Rule when parking your car

Major issues do not aggravate the public as much as ostensibly trivial irritations; such as bad parking.

Everyone knows which qualifications are required to park in bays specifically for the disabled, or parents and children. Yet many non-disabled and childless motorists justify (to themselves) using these bays if it saves them more than 18 inches of walking.

The same applies to parking in non-existent bays, over the hatching, pick-up points when not picking up, etc. This is to say nothing of routinely ignored no entry signs, with Asda in Leechmere a notable hot-spot in this regard.

The boors who park so lazily and thoughtlessly, do so as they feel they are somehow special.

Bad and ignorant parking has been around since before Henry Ford packed in his paper round. But is it getting worse? The Echo has recently run stories on some extremely awful examples; and not in car parks.

One section of pavement on the shopping area of Chester Road does host some careful parking, but only to facilitate two cars blocking the route for pedestrians, rather than just the one.

Cars near Burn Park appear to be not so much parked over the adjacent cycle path as randomly abandoned.

Double yellow lines? They’re there to be ignored. Zig-zag lines? Ditto. “School Keep Clear”? What does that even mean?

Pushchair and mobility scooter users forced to use busy main roads? What’s the problem?

On the occasions when parking tickets are actually issued, the guilty parties are bewilderingly yet invariably indignant as they were “only in the shop for a minute”.

More enforcement would be welcome. But blaming a scarcity of parking wardens for dangerous and frankly pig-ignorant parking, is from the same mode of thought which exonerates litter droppers and vandals on the grounds that the council should have cleaned up after them.

Please. Considerate parking isn’t difficult for any competent driver and it makes life all the more pleasant. Be nice. Follow the Golden Rule.