By Chris Gray

THE me, me, me morons who daily queue-jump along the Botley Road by pretending to use the Seacourt park and ride car park will be delighted to know they have nothing to fear from the highways authority.

Indeed, I would now urge all drivers approaching from the west to get in on the act and likewise make use of the dedicated lane that serves the car park.

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This should prove fairer to all than the current situation in which law-abiding motorists wait in a queue as others undertake in the lane, turn into the car park, then immediately re-emerge to continue, some way ahead, along Botley Road.

This has been going on for years; indeed I first discussed the problem here when the car park opened.

There were hopes, though, that the queue-jumping would be curbed after the matter was raised with officers by the county councillor Susanna Pressel. This was at the beginning of January. She has just received a reply, which she calls “disappointing”. And so it is.

Paul Fermer, the assistant director of highways and transport operations, said: “Under current legislation Oxfordshire County Council can only enforce bus lanes in respect to moving traffic contraventions, and only in the city. The issue with entry into the P&R is that legislatively vehicles are not entering a bus lane; essentially it’s a road with restrictions.

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“Even if it was legally possible . . . there would be challenges to implementing it with the current access arrangements. Any enforcement would need clear evidence that motorists drove along the P&R lane and then exited without stopping to either park or drop someone off to use the P&R bus service. This would require a number of CCTV cameras at different locations and an officer to physically view vehicles in real time to prove that they didn’t use the car park or drop off a passenger.

“I am sorry that it is not possible to progress at this moment in time.”

So, as I said, let’s all carry on queue-jumping.