Farmer fined again for "parking tractor" in Paris

Even though Patrick Pilak has a right to be annoyed and frustrated, he seems to be keeping a remarkably cool head.

He has just received another fine for parking illegally in tenth arrondissement of the French capital.

(from Wikipedia)

Something of a surprise really as spaces are plentiful in August when many Parisians are on holiday and it's not that difficult to find a place to leave your vehicle without picking up a ticket.

But of course this is no ordinary case of "illegal parking".

You see Pilak isn't from Paris and the vehicle in question isn't exactly one that would go unnoticed if you saw it parked in the rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis, where the ticket was issued.

It's a tractor.

Pilak uses it for his job.

He's a farmer in the village of Gouzougnat in the département of Creuse - almost 400 kilometres from Paris.

OK. OK. So it's a simple mistake - right?

Well, not so simple as it's not the first time he has received a fine for apparently parking his tractor in Paris.

Just after Christmas last year he opened his mail to discover the first of what has now amounted to three different tickets for a clearly impossible parking infringements.

Back then he joked about it, sent a letter by registered delivery saying there must have been some mistake and thought no more of it.

He didn't receive any response.

In May a second ticket plopped through his letterbox - the same registration number (his tractor), the same street - rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis in Paris.

This time he wasn't so amused, as he told the regional daily, La Montagne.

"Once again I sent letter by registered delivery and I also filed a complaint," he told the paper.

"The first time it made me smile, but for it to happen a second time means that it's clearly not a computer error."

The response? There wasn't one - well not to his letter.

But there was another parking ticket - a third one - that arrived this week. Same registration number (his tractor of course), same street.

"To me it's obvious that someone is driving around with false number plates," he told RTL radio.

"I've half a mind to drive to Paris just to see if I can actually drive a tractor along rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis and, who knows, perhaps I'll actually find the vehicle that's driving around with the same licence plate."

Should Pilak actually carry out his "threat" he would likely have the backing of the mayor of Gouzougnat, Eric Yoth, who thinks the whole story has now gone beyond a joke.

"It surely can't be that difficult to find the vehicle or the owner as three tickets have now been issued - all in the same street," he told Agence France Presse.

"This ridiculous story has to have an end."

Fined for parking a tractor...in Paris

We've surely all at one time or another had a brush with bureaucracy that has left us perhaps exasperated at the "jobsworth" attitude of some people and frustrated but shoulder-shrugging at the "them's the rules" of others.

Occasionally though mistakes are made that surely cannot fail to bring a smile to the face, especially when they are so self-evidently ridiculous.

Such is the case of Patrick Pilak who, just before Christmas, opened up his mail to discover a fine for a "parking infringement" issued in Paris.

(Screenshot from France 3 news)

Not so strange, you might be thinking. After all, if you're at all familiar with Paris you'll know just how difficult it can be to find a parking space at the best of times and the pre-Christmas shopping period was one that certainly encouraged the capital's motorists to be more "creative" than ever.

Except Pilak isn't from Paris. In fact he's from nowhere near the city.

He's a farmer in the village of Gouzougnat in the département of Creuse slap, bang in the heart of rural France in the département of Creuse and almost 400 kilometres from the French capital.

And that fine? Well it wasn't just for your run-of-the-mill hatchback, a family saloon or even a hulking four-wheel drive some might insist piloting around Paris.

Nope (worse perhaps) it was for a tractor, owned by Pilak, which had apparently been illegally parked on the rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis at a point at which the street could most be definitely described as "colourful" or "a quarter best known for its ladies of easy virtue" as France 3 television described it.

It didn't take the 49-year-old bio farmer long to work out that there must have been some sort of mistake.

The registration number of the vehicle that had committed the infraction tallied with that of his tractor, but it was also described as a "Ford" whereas Pilak drove a "Renault"...around his fields.

Apart from that of course, he couldn't possibly have been in Paris at the time in question as he had been working.

"I replied by registered mail explaining that the vehicle that had apparently been parked illegally was in fact a tractor - my tractor," he told France 3 news.

"And I added that I couldn't possibly have been where the alleged offence took place at the time indicated because I was working almost 400 kilometres away."

Pilak doesn't intend to pay the €11 fine and of course realises that that there has been some sort of mix-up, but just to drive (sorry) home the point he calculated for Agence France Presse how long the (one-way) journey time would be from Gouzougnat to Paris.

"If I wanted to go to Paris it certainly wouldn't be by tractor,' he said.

"At 15 kilometres per hour maximum speed it would take more than 24 hours to make the trip."

French baker fined for sounding his horn

Paulo Païs appeared in court in France on Monday to appeal a 1,000 euros fine imposed on him for breaking the highway code and "misusing his van horn" while making his early morning rounds.

Païs runs a bakery in Nesles-la-Vallée, a village 40 kilometres north of the French capital.

He used to make an early morning round of neighbouring towns and villages in his van to deliver locals those freshly baked baguettes, croissants and pains chocolate that are so much a part of many a French breakfast table.

It's the kind tradition that still exists in hundreds of villages around the country, especially those in which there is no longer a bakery.

And to let people know he had arrived, in that time honoured convention he tooted his horn.

That was where his problems started.

Last September he had to stop his round after a couple living in a housing estate in the nearby town of Méry-sur-Oise filed a complaint because of the noise he was making when he turned up at 8.30 every morning.

The wife was a nurse who worked nights and although she "had nothing personally against the baker," the sound of his horn "prevented her from getting to sleep just as she was about to drop off."

When the case came to court in December, Païs was fined 1,000 euros for breaking Article 416-1 of the highway code in France, which stipulates that a car horn may only be used "to warn of danger".

The case caused a commotion in the town, with a petition being launched and signatures gathered to allow Païs to resume his round - horn and all.

The story was picked up by the national media after the fine was handed down, and a lawyer in the eastern French city of Strasbourg (over 500 kilometres away from the "scene of the crime") agreed to offer his services for free, which enabled Païs to appeal the original ruling.

Monday might have seen Païs have his day in court as his appeal was heard, but the consequences so far on his business have been dramatic.

"Since I stopped the round turnover has dropped and I've had to let an employee go," he said before Monday's hearing.

"What I was doing was providing a service especially to elderly people in villages without a bakery, and simply signalling my arrival just as hundreds of other bakers, greengrocers and butchers who make deliveries in such a manner do around the country," he continued.

"But apparently not everyone liked what I was doing."

While Païs will have to wait until May to discover the outcome of his appeal, the couple who filed the original complaint are considering moving as none of their neighbours is speaking to them anymore according to the wife.

French motorcyclist fined for wearing contact lenses

All right the headline is a little misleading as will become clear. But in essence it's what happened.

Once again it's time to say "road users in France beware".

After the recent case of a motorist being fined (€22) for smoking behind the wheel of his car, comes the story of a motorcyclist being pulled over for not "having glasses about his person" - to put it in good "police speak".

It happened last Tuesday on the streets of the French capital as Jérôme, an engineer, set out on his motor scooter to an appointment at the dentist.

At one point on his journey he ran a traffic light as it turned amber to "avoid braking too suddenly". But as (bad) luck would have it a couple of police officers saw him and he was stopped.

Now, what would have been a standard infraction with a possible €22 fine quickly escalated to something a little more absurd as he was asked for his papers, which the 37-year-old duly handed over.

Jérôme you see is near-sighted and as such required by law to wear glasses, or at least have them somewhere in the vehicle when driving, although the language on his licence puts it in a more gobbledygook fashion than that.

At least that's how the officers on duty interpreted the law.

Well he wasn't wearing glasses, but he was wearing contact lenses, which you might be thinking would have conformed with the sense of what was actually written on his licence.

Er....think again.

Because he didn't have a supplementary pair of glasses with him, one of the police officers handed Jérôme a €90 fine and lopped three points from him for "driving a vehicle without respecting the restrictions mentioned on his licence."

What's more he also advised him to "read the highway code again."

And that's exactly what Jérôme did, but he couldn't find the exact text to which the officer was referring and has decided to contest the fine.

"I don't consider it to be justified," he said.

"I'm not a danger to society and besides without lenses I don't see anything."

He's not alone in thinking the officer overreacted and has of Jean-Baptiste Iosca, a lawyer specialising in the rules of the road and traffic contraventions.

"The law requiring all drivers to carry a pair of glasses in the glove compartment of the vehicle was repealed in 1997," he said.

"I dealt with a similar case in May this year and my client was not charged."

Um. Who should it be Jérôme rereading the highway code?