Blow for council in Southall junction battle (From Ealing Times)

Adjudicator tells council to pay costs over South Road junctions

12:25pm Wednesday 29th October 2008 in News By Alex Hayes

THE council was today orderd to pay £750 in costs to a bus company in what could be a decisive round in a battle over two box junctions in Southall.

London United Busways were challenging 17 tickets handed to it for drivers stopping in two controversial junctions in South Road.

Previously four different adjudicators at the Parking and Traffic Appeals Service (PATAS) had ruled against the council on cases on these two junctions since January.

The move to award the costs against Ealing Council could see a further 65 tickets issued to the company since March quashed, and bring on a review of the markings at the junctions of St Joseph's Drive and Cambridge Road by officers.

Campaigner Jim Douglas, who has been fighting to get Ealing Council to change the two yellow box junctions which are enforced by cameras, described the victory as “highly significant”.

He said: “This is what we have been waiting for. It opens up the possibility of costs for ever other person who has appealed the tickets on these junctions.

“Unless they cancel their opposition to all other appeals it is going to be quite a drain on their resources.

“To get costs here is the equivalent of the adjudicator telling the council to get their house in order.”

Earlier this year the Ealing Times revealed the junction of South Road and St Joseph's Drive had raked in more than £1m for the council in the 2007/8 financial year, despite campaigners saying they were wrongly marked.

Mr Douglas has represented several people who have had their appeals over costs for the junction upheld, arguing the marking cover the whole of South Road at both junctions, where they should only be painted across the lane closest to the joining road.

At today's hearing at New Zealand House in the Haymarket, Jackie Adams, representing Ealing Council, tried to argue the diagrams governing the way junctions should be set out were not clear, and the two types could be applied to either T-junctions or crossroads.

However, in his summing up Adjudicator Gerald Styles said: “I think the council has got it wrong.

“I am awarding costs on the grounds the council has been wholly unreasonable. It is the disregard of the earlier decisions from which consideration has to flow.”

In a previous case the council had been threatened with costs if it fought more appeals on the junctions.

It now remains to be seen whether the council intends to continue to enforce the penalties for the junction while it awaits a decision from the Department for Transport (DfT) as to whether the boxes are enforceable.