Sydney woman cops $275 fine after car breaks down in no-stopping zone
A woman whose car broke down on a residential street was shocked when she was slapped with a $275 fine — despite alerting the local council and police it was there.
"I broke down on a windy, cold Friday night on a one way street [in Clovelly]," Clare Tamas explained.
"I was blocking the street, cold, hungry, hazard lights on, redirecting traffic while I waited for roadside assistance."
Ms Tamas, who lives in Clovelly in Sydney's east, said she was told somebody would be able to come and help her within three hours, but as she was in the middle of a one way street she called the local police station for advice.
"I was doing the right thing because I had my hazard lights on," she told Yahoo News Australia.
"Obviously I had to sort of position myself outside of the car so that I could also advise drivers who were coming down that street to turn around."
Because her car had overheated, Ms Tamas was able to restart it eventually to move it to the side of the street so cars could pass while she waited for assistance.
"Because there's no parking available, the nearest and only available spot was in a no-stopping zone," she explained. "So I had no choice but [to park it there]."
"I also made another phone call to the police station to let them know the progress, and to let them know that I was in a no-stopping zone and they said not to worry about it."
Ms Tamas said she then spoke to her insurer who said if she were to receive a parking ticket they would be able to provide her with some evidence of her situation to have it waived.
Fined the next day despite being told she could park there
Ms Tamas was advised to wait until Monday to get her car towed to a mechanic to avoid extra costs, leaving a note on her car explaining why it was in a no-stopping zone.
However, on Saturday morning she was fined for the parking space, but didn't receive the notice for a few weeks.
"To my surprise, a ticket landed in my mailbox [two weeks later] citing Randwick council as the initiator of the ticket," the disgruntled driver said.
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"Because my car was towed on the Monday morning, roadside assistance is now saying that they can only give me paperwork on the day the car was towed despite the fact that I've got a call log with them on the Friday night,"
Ms Tamas, who has the right to challenge the penalty, said she is sick of people being fined even though they're not doing the wrong thing.
"The human side of things going wrong just seems to have been removed from the situation," she said.
"Yes, there's a lot of people who do the wrong thing, but I just feel that there needs to be elements of consideration for people in these situations."
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