Eric Williams
Supercars outside a hotel in Mayfair, London, have been towed away by a Labour council because their owners were “so wealthy that fines barely register”.
Westminster City Council began removing supercars following complaints from residents about parking. A Saudi-registered blue Rolls-Royce worth nearly $501,000 was removed as part of the crackdown.
The council told the London Telegraph it had been “inundated” by complaints. It claimed that guests at the Chancery Rosewood Hotel, at the site of the former US embassy in Grosvenor Square, had been parking vehicles illegally on the pavement outside.
The Chancery Rosewood is a five-star hotel where room prices start from around $2800 a night.
Council officers said the cars, which included “selfishly parked” Lamborghinis and Rolls-Royces, were mostly foreign-registered and claimed that penalty charge notices had proven ineffective.
A penalty charge notice in the City of Westminster would charge the recipient between $220-280, with a 50 per cent discount if it was paid within 14 days. Standard charges for parking in Grosvenor Square are $17.70 an hour and the maximum stay is four hours.
Other cars that were parked on the pavement outside the hotel were moved voluntarily by their owners on Tuesday once council staff arrived.
Max Sullivan, the council’s cabinet member for streets, said: “Those on foot shouldn’t have to run a gauntlet of illegally and selfishly parked supercars when trying to walk around Westminster.
“That’s why we’ve used our relocation vehicle to physically move these cars out of the way. We will not tolerate dangerous pavement parking, whether it’s a Lime bike or a Lamborghini.”
A council spokesman said: “The usual approach of issuing PCNs have proven to be ineffective. The vehicles are foreign registered – the ones we photographed have Saudi numberplates – so the chances of recovering the costs are virtually nil.”
The Telegraph, London
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