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But to kick it off, I want to bring to your attention two articles from my village newsletter, and want to know your views on them. The first article was published in the March edition of the newsletter and was not accompanied by the name of the author. The second article was published in April's edition of the newsletter, and was acknowledged to be from the owner of the Post Office and its adjoining convenience store in the village.
The two articles read as follows. I'll post my opinion on these articles as soon as I finish writing them, but before then, I have to go back to my brother's house to have another bash at getting his wireless broadband up and running.
Article 1:
I am interested to note that in every edition of The Marpit, there is an article regarding drivers speeding through our villages. This is usually blamed on younger drivers such as myself. I find it more interesting to note that a more serious hazard created by vehicles, illegally parked on the double yellow lines outside the Post Office is always overlooked.The double yellow lines are there to prevent the hazard caused by the need to overtake parked vehicles on that stretch of road, which is very dangerous, and difficult to see whether it is clear to pass. Is it because the offense is often committed by our older generation, that The MArlpit and our villagers neglect to say anything about this issue?
I personally believe money would be better spent employing a traffic warden to fine those who illegally park i nthe village, to remove those unnecessary hazards from our roads. I believe this would make the village much safer, than having a flashing 30mph sign which everyone, including older drivers, ignores!
Article 2:
Dear Sirs
I couldn't disagree more with the opinion of teh unattributed piece in the March edition of The Marlpit that objects to parking outside of teh Post Office and would like to see a traffic warden fining our customers. That this is considered more important than reducing speeding is proposterous.
The parking outside the village shop obviously impedes the author in his or her rush to get to Tesco's. Perhaps he or she would like to have double yellow lines throughout the village and ban pedestrians, so that large lorries can travel safely through the village at 60mph without the risk of getting blood on their bumpers.
Coltishall is a village, not a motorway. Yellow lines serve the needs of traffic, not the needs of the villagers. The Marlpit should be campaigning to slow traffic down through the village so that all residents of the village (including the elderly and the young) can easily and safely access the facilities and services they need.
I would further suggest that articles such as this, carrying personal opinions, should not be published in the Marlpit with the identity of the author. We must otherwise assume that this is the aopinion of the editors - although I'm not sure any of esteemed editors would go so far as to describe themselves as a 'younger driver'!
Editors Comment Accompanying Article 2:
The article re parking on double yellow lines was supplied to The Marlpit with the identity of teh owner (a condition of inclusion in the Marlpit) and it is up to the editors as to whether the identity is including in the magazine.
The Marlpit is a 'vehicle' for free speech and it was considered that a different aspect of traffic problems in the village was worthy of inclusion.
The article did not 'attack' customers of the Post Office but related to illegal and potentially dangerous parking on double yellow lines within the vicinity of teh post office, a location which has extensive public off-road parking very nearby.
The Marlpit appreciates the assistance given by [Subpostmaster] to its publication and trusts that the foregoing explanation will continue our good relationship.
I will post my opinion later once I've finished writing it, but for now, I'll just say that, because I too am a new driver and not the author of the first article, I agree more, though not entirely, with the author of the first article.
[S]Any names referred to in these articles have been removed before posting on this forum to protect the identities of the authors and any person mentioned within the articles.[/S}
A tendency to blame other cultures? Possibly so, but it could well be for the sake of making it sound interesting, from a more objectional point of view, and maybe even taking advantage of peoples' ignorance. What concerned me about the VT murderer was that not enough was done concerning the apparent warning signs - as much as the incredibly lax gun laws in place in Virginia; not his background, as there are a great many things which can make a murderer, or so I would guess, aside from his background, early life and so on. But maybe that would have been a bit hard to do? Who knows, it's all so often just a ratings war.
Yet ITV and Sky continued to pick points on the nature of his place of birth. Where his parents strict? What is the South Korean culture like? It beggars belief, when our news outlets always tend to lean against the faults of other countries moreso than the faults of ours.
> From the response of the Postmaster it's obvious that the
> illegally parked cars are his customers who can't be bothered to
> find a safe place to park and just want to save 2 minutes of
> their time.
It's funny you should say that, because as the Editor remarked, public off-road parking is very nearby. Right next door in fact. The car park is huge!
> From the tone of his letter you can tell he's an arrogant idiot
> who feels it's OK to break some road rules but not others so he
> gets more custom.
That's exactly what I thought! I mean, just the other day I was approaching a blind corner which I know very well. At the other end of this very sharp corner is a narrow hump-backed bridge which is only wide enough for one vehicle. As well as that, I was driving a van, which is a little bit bigger than a car. So I started to go up onto the bridge from the other direction, slowly because I know tehre's been a lot of activity around there recently, and (get this) an OLD WOMAN (I'd guess 60-70) came roaring round the corner at about 35 mph, which is far too fast for that corner, in her rather expensive automatic BMW. She nearly rammed me off the road, and I bet if you tried putting your little finger between the van and her car at the time, you wouldn't have a little finger anymore. That's how close we were, without actually touching, thank God.
> Also the attack on the integrity of the newsletter saying it's
> not for opinions is way offline as what does he think he's
> doing!
Well the funny part about his response is that he mentions a boy racer trying to get to Tesco. I can tell where he's got that idea from - it's where all the chavs hang out. But the funny thing is, the Post Office is in the complete opposite direction to TEsco! Zoom in on Coltishall in Google Earth or something, and you'll see that Norwich is towards the south, where TEsco is. But Wroxham Road is where the Post Office is in the village, which goes north east! And he honestly can't say it's a villager rushing to TEsco, because past the Post Office is pretty much the end of the village!
Personally, I agree that speeding is a massive problem in our villages because the roads are far too narrow, and there's also a vast assortment of blind bends here, but I don't think speeding is the biggest problem. The biggest problems are people parking in all the wrong places as the author said, even double-parking I've encountered. But other problems include parking i nillegal positions, speeding OAPs which the author hinted at, which I have made an example of in this post, large lorries attempting illegal turns in the village (eg. turning right at the central garage, where there is a No Right Turn sign) massive farm and lorry vehicles speeding through the village and the fact that the council keeps refusing our petitions to get a zebra/pelican crossing installed in the village.
There are probably far more problems, but I can't think of them at the moment.
I wonder how many "Chavs" actually wore Burberry before it was reported that they did in the papers? Wouldn't be surprised if a reporter saw one group wearing Burberry and decided that they all did.
Some papers like to see the world in black and white (oh yes, see what I did there?) when it's actually rather grey.
From the tone of his letter you can tell he's an arrogant idiot who feels it's OK to break some road rules but not others so he gets more custom.
Also the attack on the integrity of the newsletter saying it's not for opinions is way offline as what does he think he's doing!
I'll get onto general media stereotyping later.....
But to kick it off, I want to bring to your attention two articles from my village newsletter, and want to know your views on them. The first article was published in the March edition of the newsletter and was not accompanied by the name of the author. The second article was published in April's edition of the newsletter, and was acknowledged to be from the owner of the Post Office and its adjoining convenience store in the village.
The two articles read as follows. I'll post my opinion on these articles as soon as I finish writing them, but before then, I have to go back to my brother's house to have another bash at getting his wireless broadband up and running.
Article 1:
I am interested to note that in every edition of The Marpit, there is an article regarding drivers speeding through our villages. This is usually blamed on younger drivers such as myself. I find it more interesting to note that a more serious hazard created by vehicles, illegally parked on the double yellow lines outside the Post Office is always overlooked.The double yellow lines are there to prevent the hazard caused by the need to overtake parked vehicles on that stretch of road, which is very dangerous, and difficult to see whether it is clear to pass. Is it because the offense is often committed by our older generation, that The MArlpit and our villagers neglect to say anything about this issue?
I personally believe money would be better spent employing a traffic warden to fine those who illegally park i nthe village, to remove those unnecessary hazards from our roads. I believe this would make the village much safer, than having a flashing 30mph sign which everyone, including older drivers, ignores!
Article 2:
Dear Sirs
I couldn't disagree more with the opinion of teh unattributed piece in the March edition of The Marlpit that objects to parking outside of teh Post Office and would like to see a traffic warden fining our customers. That this is considered more important than reducing speeding is proposterous.
The parking outside the village shop obviously impedes the author in his or her rush to get to Tesco's. Perhaps he or she would like to have double yellow lines throughout the village and ban pedestrians, so that large lorries can travel safely through the village at 60mph without the risk of getting blood on their bumpers.
Coltishall is a village, not a motorway. Yellow lines serve the needs of traffic, not the needs of the villagers. The Marlpit should be campaigning to slow traffic down through the village so that all residents of the village (including the elderly and the young) can easily and safely access the facilities and services they need.
I would further suggest that articles such as this, carrying personal opinions, should not be published in the Marlpit with the identity of the author. We must otherwise assume that this is the aopinion of the editors - although I'm not sure any of esteemed editors would go so far as to describe themselves as a 'younger driver'!
Editors Comment Accompanying Article 2:
The article re parking on double yellow lines was supplied to The Marlpit with the identity of teh owner (a condition of inclusion in the Marlpit) and it is up to the editors as to whether the identity is including in the magazine.
The Marlpit is a 'vehicle' for free speech and it was considered that a different aspect of traffic problems in the village was worthy of inclusion.
The article did not 'attack' customers of the Post Office but related to illegal and potentially dangerous parking on double yellow lines within the vicinity of teh post office, a location which has extensive public off-road parking very nearby.
The Marlpit appreciates the assistance given by [Subpostmaster] to its publication and trusts that the foregoing explanation will continue our good relationship.
I will post my opinion later once I've finished writing it, but for now, I'll just say that, because I too am a new driver and not the author of the first article, I agree more, though not entirely, with the author of the first article.
[S]Any names referred to in these articles have been removed before posting on this forum to protect the identities of the authors and any person mentioned within the articles.[/S}