The police long since withdrew from parking so the traditional "Traffic Warden" is no longer employed instead councils enforce the parking restrictions they put in place.

If there are no restrictions on the lane the council will not become involved.

Can you install a large step or handrail?

Personally if I were observing a regular parker blocking the exit after having identified where they were "working" I would draft a letter pointing out their reckless action has the potential to endanger life and in the event a tragedy were to happen details (the vehicle and the businesses involved) would be passed to the relevant authorities.

It is not only ignorant but a negligent behaviour - 18 years "Gross Negligent"?

Or a quick call/email to the HSE with offending company details and a photograph or two.

Originally Posted by: Roundtuit

Or a quick call/email to the HSE with offending company details and a photograph or two.

Sorry, missed that from my list - HSE says talk to the council.

You have not mentioned this, but once you have worked out who it is could you just go and ask them not to block your fire exit that you are legally required to have. You could mention you have had contact with the fire brigade ( you don’t have to mention they will do zip), and that you would hate for their vehicle to be towed or accidentally damaged in a fire drill.

Chris

You have my sympathy as when I was an Enforcing Officer in London, my patch had scores - perhaps 100s - of overheight single starcase premises that relied on escape route through neighbouring premises - either a yard/open space or often through the building or over the roof and inside next door.

When the neighbour unilaterally blocked them there was little we could do. In some cases, we had no alternative to ask the complainant to agree to not use a floor or part of a building in lieu of being served with a prohibition notice. Not a nice thing to do, but its not possible to turn a blind eye to these problems.  

Can I ask, assuming that final exit in question is required, what measures have you made to introduce control measures to keep relevant persons safe with your demise?

If you don’t want confrontation, then perhaps just a couple of traffic cone with no parking on them placed either side of the door may work ( they may get moved though). You say they park tight to the building, I assume to allow other vehicles to pass without taking their mirrors off. Therefore, just moving them out a few inches may be deterrent enough. If you think cones will be stolen, then something that sticks out a little on the wall at wing mirror height (flower basket that bolts to the wall)

The other option is to park there yourselves for a few days if you can get there before them, to see if they find a better alternative ( they may not then bother to check after that).

Paint your own yellow lines (no one is enforcing anything anyway)

If it is builders doing work in the area, it may not last long anyway.

All just thinking out loud, may not be practical when at the sharp end.

Chris

Not sure we should be condoning deliberate criminal damage on this website...

The  Criminal Damage Act 1971, Section 5  allows “lawful excuse” as a defence, for example if you need to protect your own property sub section c) saying:

  if he destroyed or damaged or threatened to destroy or damage the property in question or… intended to use or cause or permit the use of something to destroy or damage it, in order to protect property belonging to himself or another or a right or interest in property which was or which he believed to be vested in himself or another, and at the time of the act or acts alleged to constitute the offence he believed—

1. that the property, right or interest was in immediate need of protection; and
2. that the means of protection adopted or proposed to be adopted were or would be reasonable having regard to all the circumstances.

(3)For the purposes of this section it is immaterial whether a belief is justified or not if it is honestly held.

So, we collectively suggest that you:

1. Find who the “narrow service road” belongs to. If it a public highway that has been adopted  by the local council then really it is their responsibility. If they are shirking this then you might as well tell them this.
2. It might be a private road  in which case you need to find the owner who might be the landlord or their agents. Usually they are  very keen to put up signs and threaten to fine people who park on their land-money for old rope as far as they are concerned.
3. Engage with who ever is parking regularly there. For a small fee the DVLA will inform you who the registered  keeper of a vehicle is. You can start polite and then escalate. A neighbour of mine who was sick and tired someone using her parking space( owned and paid for) to park their van despite being based several streets away. She finally put big notice on the vehicle’s windscreen explaining the situation. She used EvoStik to attached the notice to the windscreen. They got the message.
4. Finally, lawyers…

We seem to have resolved this issue, if anyone is interested.  I'm not sure what turned the tide, but after months of nagging facilities manager and landlord things seem to have improved.

It may be relevant that our lease is coming up to a break point and we considered exercising the break option because we considered the office was not fit for purpose because it had inadequate fire exits. There are other nearby offices with vacant space, so decanting elsewhere, while disruptive (60 staff to move, some fairly major IT - that office is our UK fallback IT hub) would not be catastrophic - it wouldn't be an empty threat.

However, someone is now engaging with the causes of the blocks and checking the exit is unobstructed has been added to responsibilities of security patrols (with some extyra visits for that purpose).

So, I don't have a silver bullet to report - basically people we were dealing with eventually got round to doing their jobs, and problem has gone away...