The Law on reforming the vehicle parking area, signed by the President last year, would “shot” in September, so car owners still have time to study all of its nuances and choose their own behavior strategy.
The problem with the chaotic parking of cars, especially in large cities, is really very sharp. And, like that dragon from fairy tales, it has three “heads”. First of all, due to the natural desire of people to live in comfort, the number of residents in cities is growing. This automatically leads to an increase in the number of cars. The second component of the problem: the carrying capacity of roads has long left much to be desired, and the attempts to save the situation by erecting modern interchanges often remain good intentions because of lack of funds and unwillingness to look for them.
And, finally, the third “head” of this “dragon”: promises to equip parking, mostly remain promises in our realities, because the next authority usually forgets everything that the previous one did, even if there was a rational grain. This time, too, we have an attempt to regulate chaos on the roads with legislative methods. However, having piled into the law a whole bunch of sticks for the owners of vehicles, no one even remembered the carrots for them.
Reflecting on this problem, I remembered the situation in which I found myself, when the inspectors of the State Traffic Police followed the order on Ukrainian roads. So, the evening time, Saksagansky street, Kyiv – the road with one-way traffic, has 6 lanes. I was near the department store “Ukraine” to the left. Signs were allowed to turn left from two left lanes (the remaining 4 lanes – straight on and right). However, the leftmost was tightly packed with cars, parked there, which are placed at an angle to the sidewalk. It turned out that those cars that needed to go to the left, were forced to climb in one lane, which took a lot of time, because the bandwidth of one lane is half that of two.
“And where do you see a lane of traffic? That is the parking lane”
It is clear that some drivers could not stand it – and they turned left from the third lane, which is actually the second lane (if you consider that the first lane was turned into parking). And on the island for pedestrians, located at the crossroads opposite the department store – the car of the State Traffic Police. The guys in the uniform were watching, so that no one violated. And stopped those, who turned left from the “wrong” lane. I came closer, already realizing that the striped rod “will greet” me too, because even to rearrange to the left was too late. Dashing sergeant was really happily waving his black and white stick, trumpeting and just as joyfully began to explain to me what I broke, having decided to turn from the third lane. I turned on “naivety” mode and said: “Inspector, the signs allow us to turn from two lanes, I turned from the second”. He was dumbfounded for a moment, and then he started counting the lanes with his fingers, – that’s for me to be more visible.
Mentally, I laughed and joined the game, proposed by the traffic cops – and also started to count the lanes, poking at them with my hand. Only the inspector got three, and I had… two. I did not want to admit that the extreme lane, where cars were parked, was also the lane for driving cars. I understood that the traffic cops were formally right, so I barely hold back my smile and asked: “And where do you see the traffic lane there? That is a parking lane! Because if it is a lane for traffic, then I want to go by it… ” – the inspector seriously stuck and decided to call a senior partner. He approached, listened to the explanations – mine, and his younger colleague – and suddenly burst out laughing. “Let her go, – he said, – no one has given me such a reason to pass from this lane to the left”…
Laugh all you want, but the problem with the parking lots has been and remains. And over time, it is also exacerbated, given that the number of cars is increasing. And on the capital’s Saksagansky street the first lane is still confidently serves precisely for parking. Of course, those drivers, who during peak hours have to drive through Saksagansky are indignant, blaming those, who left the cars there. And those, who come there in an organization or at work are indignant that they do not have the opportunity to park their cars normally. Who is more right, who is more to blame?
You can nod to any number of laws, regulations and other regulatory documents, but in such situations, usually everyone has their own truth. And now, having passed the Law on reforming the sphere of parking of vehicles, changing the rules of parking and evacuation, legislators claim before the drivers, from the autumn there will be an opportunity to bring order to our roads. Taking into account the results of reforming of the other spheres of Ukrainian life, we decided to ask the experts what auto owners should really expect.
Reasons to punish
If you open the text of the new law, it first of all deals with violations of the rules of stopping, stay, parking, non-payment for parking on the pay site, and parking of cars in the places for people with disabilities. Interestingly, the law provides for as many as 17 specific cases of evacuation! The most important: if your car is on the carriageway in two or more rows, as well as at railway crossings, tramways, pedestrian crossings and public transport stops.
“The law provides for the creation of a mechanism of the inevitability of responsibility for violating the rules for stopping, stay and parking the car through the introduction of photo and video recording of offenses, – explains the lawyer Oleg Rachuk, Managing Partner of the Law Firm “Oleg Rachuk Law Firm”, to DUMKA. – It is primarily about the extension of the mechanism of bringing to administrative responsibility the person, for whom the vehicle is registered, that is, the owner of the car, for certain violations of traffic rules recorded in automatic mode, for cases of violation of the rules of stopping, staying or parking”. According to the lawyer, while on the windshield of the car-violator must necessarily remain a trace – a copy of the decision or a message about the decision to bring to administrative responsibility for violations, recorded in a photo or video.
The expert notes that the new law provides for the introduction of the institute of parking inspectors, who will be entitled to bring to justice the perpetrators (if the violation is recorded in the mode of taking a photo/video recording) on a par with policemen. And they will have to evacuate the cars-violators to special penalty areas. However, a question, which of the Ukrainian settlements has the necessary number of fine-equipped penalty areas, still remains open. Like a number of others. Let’s say, who will answer if during transportation or storage on such a site of your car it will be harmed? And most importantly: is not it better if the means that should be directed to the arrangement of penalties, redirect to the creation of parking lots? So far we have not received an answer to these questions, so we will keep the topic under control.
According to Oleg Rachuk, from now, all cases of a significant obstacle to traffic or creating a threat to traffic safety are very clearly outlined. First of all, we are talking about the location of the cars in the places of stopping or parking prohibited, on the designated lane for the movement of buses, trams, trolleybuses and mini buses, indicated by the corresponding road signs and/or road markings to the bicycle path, prohibited by the Rules of the Road. And also, when the car stands so that it hinders the movement of other vehicles, it prevents pedestrians, in particular mothers with baby carriages and people, who are wheelchair users. It is also impossible to hamper the movement or operation of a snow-removal and other technological municipal transport in case of emergency or in case of declaring a separate area a zone of an emergency ecological situation. As well as violating the parking scheme of the vehicle, blocking the passage of two or more lanes.
How violations will be recorded and who will be punished
Many people consider the introduction of automatic photo and video fixing of violations the most important innovations of the law. The Ministry of Internal Affairs informs that stationary cameras will appear not only on pillars and overpasses, but also in public transport. Information from the cameras will go to the data centers, where, as a result of the check, the police will make a decision with the date, time and place of the violation. It should be noted that when fixing violations on the camera, there will be no live communication with the police, and therefore, convince the authors of the law, this should minimize corruption on the roads. As it was explained by the acting director of the Municipal Enterprise “Kyivtransparkservis” Oleksandr Nimas, the mechanism of punishment of the owner of the car-violator is approximately this: the inspector sends a request to a single register of vehicles, receives a response about the owner and can bring him to justice, and the corresponding check should remain on the windshield.
And here, as they say, unpleasant moments begin, which could definitely be envisaged at the stage of finalizing the draft of this law. What should be done if the driver is not the owner? Now, to go at the wheel, you do not even need a power of attorney on the car.
“There are a lot of unpleasant moments, accompanying the law, therefore, to restore order due to the adding the necessary number of parking lots, but only by punishing for violations – it’s somehow strange, – the lawyer and traffic accident specialist Vadym Volodarsky says to DUMKA. – And this is, given that in the cities, there are no legal stops and parkings for cars”. According to the lawyer, the authors of the law have been dishonest still at the stage of developing the name. “In fact, this law concerns not only the field of parking – they are actually changing the whole system of prosecution for violation of traffic rules, – the expert explains. – Our lawmakers again decided to step on the old rake, placing responsibility, not on the one, who broke the law, but on the owner of the vehicle”.
The lawyer reminds that this practice has already been applied in Ukraine: the decisions that were quickly nicknamed by the people as “letters of happiness” came to the car owners from 2008 to 2010. “Only in the new version of the law, the situation of the owner of the car has further worsened, – explains Vadym Volodarsky, – in the variant, which acted earlier, the owner, having received such a letter, had the right to inform then the traffic police, who was at the wheel. For its part, the inspectors were required to fine the driver himself. Now, this norm was changed: the opportunity to “transfer the fine to the culprit” from the owner, will only be in case if the culprit comes oneself. And where have you seen such fools?!”
In the case if at the wheel of the car is not the car owner, there may be several options, says the expert: for example, they can register a real car user in the database, but it only works when the car is used by one person. If all the family members use in a row or different employees at the company are at the wheel, the owner will answer for that. “At the same time, – adds the lawyer, – the right to transfer control of the car to any person, who has the appropriate driver’s license, is not limited by the law, it can be done as before. The order, which is intended to be introduced by this law, restricts the right of the owner of the vehicle to protect himself: they are going to punish the owner – even for what he did not do, but to charge the costs on fines from the driver, who was at the wheel and committed the violation, the owner of the car cannot because such a mechanism simply is not written in the law.
Not to mention the fact that the proposed principle of responsibility undermines the constitutional basis of legal responsibility in the Ukrainian legal system as a whole. At the same time, we observe a long-standing trend when the “automotive” sphere is consistently removed from the sphere of application of constitutional norms, elementary human rights and general legal principles, creating a situation in which a person, who had the “arrogance” to buy a car or sit at the wheel does not remain generally accepted legal guarantees for other situations”.
Are the Ukrainians threatened with a parking mafia?
While drivers get acquainted with the new law, assessing their own prospects in September, the authorities are rubbing their hands and are already calculating how much money will be recovered from car owners. So, according to the deputy of Kyiv City Council Georgy Yasynsky, the capital is getting ready for new rules in the car parking area quite actively. Like, cities are given the authority to implement automated parking space monitoring systems, as well as the ability to create special inspections, will deal with traffic safety and parking control. According to Georgнy Yasynsky, this step was taken to facilitate the work of the police – so as not to distract them from the priority tasks. And how this should be understood? Does the police need even more time for making selfies?!
As for the rules, they are being violated now, Mr. Yasynsky points out, there is still no effective tool, and this law allows cities to implement it by the decision of local councils. Like, we should use the opportunities provided by the law to the fullest, because no one in the whole world waits for the driver for several hours to evacuate the car, which prevents the passage of the street, or to draw up a protocol.
But Vadym Volodarsky believes that it is impossible to solve the problem that way. “Theу are trying to sweep drivers into a corner: to be fined for the violation, and there are simply no allowed places, especially those, normally located, – he notes. – As for the evacuation of the car without the presence of the driver, I want to recall the time, when the evacuators just entered the Soviet Union. For the first time it happened in Moscow – and the first death case, when a person did not find the car in the place, where he left it, and died from a heart attack, was recorded in the first days of the introduction of this innovation. How many such cases were now in Ukraine, when they were playing with the evacuators in Kyiv in the days of Leonid Chernovetsky, no one knows – such statistics simply does not exist”.
By the way, if you remember about the evacuation of cars, many remember how these brave fellows managed to take away the car, from the market “Petrivka” in Kyiv to the penalty area, in which there was a small child. There is another aspect of the problem here. It is worth recalling how the evacuators worked in general under Chernovetsky. To pick up the car, the tow trucks stopped in the second lane. Therefore, the situation with traffic jams became worse. And the place from which the car was evacuated, immediately occupied another. And all at the same time perfectly understood that in this way the “parents” of this idea only earn money. Therefore, drivers resorted to all sorts of tricks to make it impossible to export their own cars, even if they were parked in the wrong place.
“The new law allows to seize the car in numerous cases. For example, if it is parked closer than 30 meters from a public transport stop, – Oleg Strekal, a driver with a 30-year experience of driving, explains in a commentary for DUMKA. – It is unlikely that the driver (unless he is an experienced sniper) by guess will determine this distance. And the inspector with the tape measure will come, measure out 29 meters and pick up the car! In this case, the driver will pay a penalty for violation of parking rules, the amount of which is calculated by the methods of the Cabinet. And he will also pay for the services of the evacuator and the stay of the car on the penalty area, and these sums are set by the communal enterprises, interested in earnings!
Or another collision: the inspector cannot accept cash for parking services. And there is no parking lot nearby. And under the glass of the car should be a check about payment. If there is a check – the inspector takes a photo and writes you a fine. Or he takes some money for the fact that his camera “broke down” right now… In fact, I do not deny at all that it is necessary to establish order with the “heroes of parking”. However, not at the expense of the torture of drivers and the creation of a new super-powerful parking mafia”.
The real reform of the parking area, as noted by most experts with whom DUMKA managed to communicate, requires significant investment. And there is no money, and we already have to look with the outstretched hand in the eyes of the leaders of the IMF. So, the officials are making up folding screen laws, which do not bring much benefit to the public, but they will enrich the narrow circle of parking dealers. Is this the reform that can bring Ukraine closer to Europe?
Text: Larysa Vyshynska
