Penalty charge. Should I appeal?

Associate
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I would fight it, if everyone was to contest all these ridiculous tickets then they would need to do something about being realistic with fines.
I know people that contest everything and they actually do win most of the time but it’s a risk and you could affectively double or triple the fine amount if you loose.
What means more to you the principle or the money
 
Associate
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I would fight it, if everyone was to contest all these ridiculous tickets then they would need to do something about being realistic with fines.
I know people that contest everything and they actually do win most of the time but it’s a risk and you could affectively double or triple the fine amount if you loose.
What means more to you the principle or the money
Sadly, at this moment in time the money mean more to me.
 
Associate
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As you say, it is the principle - stay out of bus lanes - AT ALL TIMES.
This is rather disturbing. In the past I am sure I have entered the bus lane to allow an ambulance to go past. In future should I not enter the bus lane when the restriction applies even if it means not allowing an emergency service to pass me with its blue light and siren operating
 
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This is rather disturbing. In the past I am sure I have entered the bus lane to allow an ambulance to go past. In future should I not enter the bus lane when the restriction applies even if it means not allowing an emergency service to pass me with its blue light and siren operating

Let the ambulance enter the bus lane. Surely if bus lane is free its the sensible route for it to go rather than wait for cars to move into it
 
Underboss
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Let the ambulance enter the bus lane. Surely if bus lane is free its the sensible route for it to go rather than wait for cars to move into it

Yep

As I quoted in my post above from the police force, it states

To sum it up :


Drivers in emergency vehicles are trained for the scenario, and will move around you where necessary
 
Soldato
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There's a large road (red route managed by TfL) I drive on where buses themselves cause a massive obstruction on the opposite side.

What naturally happens is that the traffic behind the bus overtakes coming into the lane of opposing traffic flow which means that traffic has to significantly overlap the bus lane on it's left. Traffic carries on smoothly. If they started to give tickets for this they would catch hundreds, if not thousands of vehicles a day.

On this same road as there are many right turns there are always situations where the traffic has to undertake. Again if they penalised this they would also catch hundreds if not thousands each day.

Fortunately, even though there are bus lane cameras along this entire road, TfL don't issue tickets here as they are reasonable (as they know these are obstructions on the road). I believe they allow brief entrance into a bus lane as long as it isn't to beat a column of traffic (to turn left for example).

edit:

The other thing to remember is that bus lane cameras can't see too far ahead sometimes. So it's not always easy to distinguish between traffic and an obstructing vehicle turning right. Hence I would never undertake (using a bus lane) lots of cars that are waiting to turn right or waiting behind a car turning right.
 
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Associate
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I'm feeling a bit wobbly.
I had to enter the bus lane to manoeuvre away from a car (idiot) who entered my lane to overtake a bus. He was doing in excess of 30 mph. It was either I move out the way or stay put to discover the consequences of my action.
 
Soldato
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No. I found out that the insurance will not reduce by much. Not worth it. So no dashcam

They are good for covering your own back. I have one but I never bothered telling my insurer. Crash for cash scams won't work if you have it on camera.
 
Associate
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its not there to help reduce your insurance each year, its there to protect you

my last accident, a van pulled out at me on a roundabout, he was lying , he was saying a different road and i went into the back of him
dashcam proved otherwise ;)
I see, point taken.
I drive less than 4000 miles per year so I suppose I escape issues such as yours.
 
Soldato
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Fortunately, even though there are bus lane cameras along this entire road, TfL don't issue tickets here as they are reasonable (as they know these are obstructions on the road). I believe they allow brief entrance into a bus lane as long as it isn't to beat a column of traffic (to turn left for example).

how do you know they don't ? - I just looked where I travel. - I'd check

But there was a massive increase because in 2016/17, there were 26,000 fines issued by cameras across the city but in the last financial year that figure shot up to 46,300. These numbers have raised the fine income from £589,000 in 2016/17 to £1.1 million.

And data for Newmarket Road just obtained by Cambridgeshire Live found from May 2017 to April 30 2019 there were 6,568 fines issued on the busy road inbound and 9,339 for cars flouting the bus lane ban heading out of the city.

that's 9 a day, on road i use
edit: 126 a day for ths small city !
 
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