I visited my parents on Waiheke yesterday and my Mum was telling me a story about an Uber driver she’d had in town who was taking her through Auckland’s CBD, which – as most Aucklanders know, is a bit of a dive these days and certainly not easy to navigate if you’re in a car. They’ve made it so impossible to drive through the city now – that like most cities these days - if you’re in a car you’re punished, they’d prefer you on a bus or a bike.
But that doesn’t work for everybody and this driver was telling Mum how he'd been transporting a passenger with a disability, who was unable to get on a bus or ride a bike, so he was driving her to her destination, and it became apparent there was nowhere for him to stop to let her out. He realised that with all the parking taken away and all the cycle lanes and enlarged pedestrian paths, he’d have to stop a fair way from where she needed to get to, and she would have to walk back.
Worried about his duty as an Uber driver to deliver her safely to her destination, he parked further up the road where he could stop, and got out to help her. Now this was not a legit park, because there is no parking for cars on the main street, it was either a loading zone or a 5 minute park but it was his only option to get her as close to where she needed to be. But given her disability he realised she could not get their unaided. So he parked and offered to help her walk back to her destination. She was very grateful and he assisted her - slowly – at her pace – all the way back to where she needed to go.
Once she was safely inside – and very grateful, he returned to his car. There waiting for him was a $160 parking ticket. Aggrieved at this, once he finished his shift he wrote to Auckland Transport explaining the circumstances and contesting the fine. He argued that because of measures by Waka Kotahi to eradicate parks and make life difficult for cars, it had in fact made life difficult for those with disabilities too.
He argued he was doing the only right thing an Uber driver should, which was to help get this person to their destination, she needed assistance, and he wanted to provide it given he could not stop exactly where she needed to be.
You may or may not be surprised to learn the response he got back. Auckland Transport denied his application to contest the fine, insisted he had breached parking rules by stopping there, and insisted he pay up the $160 dollars. Now what sort of kind caring society are we attempting to dream up here with all this ideology around ‘shared spaces’ and making CBD’s more user friendly, when disabled people are penalised, and those trying to help them get fined?
What message does that send other Uber and taxi drivers trying to help passengers with disabilities? And does this kind of behaviour not just discourage more people from coming to town? Surely there’s a line – and room for discretion when it comes to unique circumstances?
My Mum encouraged the Uber driver to keep writing to Auckland Transport until they acquiesced, but as he told her, whose got the time for that? Ironically the boffins bogged down in this bureaucracy have the audacity to call this long running campaign of car elimination “Streets for People”.
But aside from cyclists, I’m just not sure which ‘people’ they’re thinking these streets are for now, given they’re certainly not for Ubers, taxis or people with disabilities.
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