Shoot the hostage.
And oh my god, what happens if his car starts shooting poisonous venom everywhere, and a giant rabid grizzly crawls out of the truck and aliens land and start disecting everyone?!
:rolleyes:
Didn’t he already get a Lifetime Achievement Award for that? If so, that makes him ineligible for the daily awards. Sorry.
Where is that thread with the ridiculous hypotheticals that Kel Varnsen started?
What if it’s a fire sale? I mean, c’mon, cut us some slack.
Why do you care where people park? If they get a ticket what is it to you? If an actual emergency occurs they deal with the consequences. How does the fact that they parked in a fire lane affect you? Unless you work in Emergency Services, then disregard.
Then I suggest you just lay back and enjoy the anal probe - because it sounds like the most pleasant thing that’s going to happen to you that day.
-Joe
danceswithcats is a long-time volunteer fire-fighter.
And people should care about things like this. It’s because everyone thinks “why should I care?” that things like this have become so bloody common that no one thinks it’s worth caring about. More importantly, parking in a fire lane is a Public Safety Hazard and is against the law.
Why do I care? Because it’s fucking wrong, that’s why! Why does anyone care about the things they bring to the Pit? Why do I have to have a dog in the fight in your opinion for my upset to have validity? That’s a ludicrous presumption! I haven’t exactly hidden the fact that I’m a firefighter. Even if I wasn’t, it would still be my purview to bitch about it, with or without your permission, thank you very much.
Oh, might be more than a ticket. (Note the shout-out by Gunslinger to the SDMB.)
I care. For one thing, it’s against the law to park in a fire lane. I see this kind of thing every day at work - clearly marked fire lanes, and clearly marked ambulance bays. If an actual emergency occurs, they’ll deal with the consequences? What’s that supposed to mean? They’ll start paging the owner to please move his car? Yeah, like that’ll work.
How about when fuckwads have parked all over the firelanes and blocked access to the ER bays?
What about when an ambulance is already using the fire lane for an emergency and some jerkoff parks right behind it and blocks access to the back?
Fire engines also need plenty of room, both to manuver and to get hose and tools off the sides and back. They can’t just slip into a spot left open. They need the whole damn fire lane.
In some cases, parking in a fire lane blocks the egress and line-of-sight for emergency vehicles. They’re not quite like driving a Honda Civic. They’re big and unwieldy.
It just doesn’t matter, though. Some people feel it’s their right to park anywhere they damn well please, even in a spot outlined in red and marked “Ambulances Only.”
When I worked 24-hour shifts we’d frequently come back to the station and find cars parked in the “Ambulance Parking Only” spot. Those people were frequently parked in until the tow truck got there.
And while we’re at it, PULL TO THE RIGHT, SHIT-FOR-BRAINS! Not the left, not directly in front of me, and for the love of god, don’t just stop in the middle of the damn road.
No, that doesn’t stop the Fire Department.
I once saw a car parked in a fire lane, directly in front of the fire hydrant, at my apartment building, when a small fire occurred in one apartment, the alarm went off, and the Fire Trucks arrived. They didn’t hesitate at all, they simply put the big bumper of a fire truck up against the vehicle, put the truck in low gear, and pushed that car out of the way. Even though it’s parking brake was on and it’s transmission in park, it didn’t matter – the fire truck moved that car easily. Even from 5 stories up, I could hear metal transmission parts snapping, and could see the skid marks of rubber from the locked tires.
They pushed it out of the fire lane, out of the parking lot, and right into the middle of the street. A police patrol car was already on the scene, he got out and started writing out tickets for the car. And he must have called a tow truck too, because one arrived very soon thereafter and towed it away.
It didn’t delay the Fire Department more than about 20-30 seconds.
But the owner of that car got several tickets, a trip to the impound lot and the $140 fees there, plus some definite damage to their vehicle. That should have been enough to teach them not to park in fire lanes, you’d hope.
Heh. That reminds me of when I lived in Boston’s North End, with its narrow streets and too many cars for not enough legitimate parking spots. One smart guy had parked his car right on the corner of an intersection, completely past the “No parking beyond this point” sign. A fire truck needed to make that corner but the car was in the way of a clean turn.
The car looked mighty crumpled by the time the fire truck finished plowing over it.
If Liberal can make up reasons the car cannot be moved, I can make up six dead children who burned because the fire lane was blocked. Fair’s fair, after all.
Those poor children!
Sailboat
The fire lane isn’t there to make life easier for Emergency Services personnel. It’s there (usually*) to ensure they can provide life saving services to other people, without having to circle the block looking for a parking space. We are all affected when people disregard fire lanes. Not to mention that this practice often fouls up traffic patterns in the parking lot, as the illegally parked cars have to be avoided.
- Across the street from my old High School, they designated a bunch of fire lane areas around empty lots so that the students wouldn’t be able to park there.
Not only for emergencies…
The fire lane is usually right in front of the store, between the store and the parking lot. Where lots and lots of people are trying to cross through the traffic. Having folks (or LITTLE KIDS!) dodging out between cars isn’t a great idea either. And here, where we get our fair share of snow, folks will park there and make it nearly impossible to pass them to get to other parts of the lot.
Around here, if the curb is painted yellow or red, you best not park there!
I’m with you, danceswithcats. Nice rant!
It’s my car and I’ll park wherever the hell I want. Why should “emergency” vehicles trump my right to convenient shopping? People entering those buildings are taking a risk of fire, they should know that going in. I’m not about to give up my right to shop because those idiots can’t own up to the risks involved.
That’s my attempt to out-stupid Lib and askeptic. How’d I do?
One of the finest moments of schadenfreude I’d ever experienced was when a very large and very solid fire engine totaled a Corvette in a fire lane while the EoW ran into a store to “pick up one thing.”
Ah… beautiful day.