Portrush parking

Last year at West Strand carpark in Portrush, a young driver rolled his car forward and hit a small child. The ambulance had difficulty locating the scene of incident and then it took a further 5-10 minutes to get the ambulance into the carpark because of the height barrier.

The driver has to stop, locate a large bunch of keys, find the exact key (there are loads on the key ring), reach up high to open the padlock, force the large rusty mechanism open (and I mean force it open), return to the vehicle, drive forward, stop, return to close the height barrier, return again to the vehicle and drive on. This has to be repeated and the height barrier locked on his return. His colleague meanwhile had to run the length of the carpark to attend to the child.

I know this because I assisted the driver in the height barrier open. It was wasting so much time that I told the ambulance driver to go on whilst I stayed behind and held the height barrier open. Fortunately the child wasn't seriously hurt but it could so easily have been more serious. Whilst these barriers are stopping high vans and motorhomes in Portrush, they are clearly putting lives at risk!

It's obvious Portrush doesn't want Motorhomes or Tourists. Tough, that there problem not ours. There's plenty of other places to spend our money. Friends were up for the Pipe Band Competition, and they said the traffic wardens were putting tickets on cars staying in the hotels and b&b's very early on the Saturday morning. Everyone knows who's behind it. Don't need to name any names.