Cornwall Fire & Rescue Service Newsdesk

at 17/09/2009 09:05

A fire appliance from Cornwall County Fire Brigade will be in Hayle on Wednesday evening (16 September) as firefighters work with representatives from the police and from the ambulance service to highlight the Safe Park Scheme.

The Safe Park Scheme aims to encourage motorists to think about the safety implications for the wider community if an emergency vehicle is not able to negotiate illegally or inconsiderately parked vehicles when answering an emergency call.

Cornwall Councillor John Coombe with other members of Hayle Town Council will be seeing off the fire appliance from Hayle Library car park at 7.30pm as it embarks on its two hour exercise around the streets of Hayle.

Assistant Chief Fire Officer Ted Simpson said: “On some occasions we see cars that look as though they weren’t so much parked as abandoned. Whilst we have every sympathy with people wanting to park their cars in sight of their property, they have to bear in mind that any kind of emergency vehicle may need to get through.”

Tips for considerate parking include:

Remember that a fire appliance is wide and needs room not to just get through but also to manoeuvre.
Try and park down one side of the road to minimise disruption
Park as close to the kerb as possible, and remember to park straight with wheels aligned – the back end of the car or the wheels sticking out can be enough to stop the appliance getting through

Chief Fire Officer, Des Tidbury added, “People don’t realise when parking their cars that they may be putting property and - more worryingly - lives at risk. If people can try to be conscious of leaving room for a fire appliance to get through then we can avoid having to damage cars by moving them or worse still a tragedy in which we cannot reach the emergency in time.”

Cornwall Council’s cabinet member for stronger communities Lance Kennedy said: “This is another example of the Fire Brigade working in partnership with other bodies. I look forward to many more opportunities promoting greater involvement with our communities.”