Dorking car-park, the biggest tourist draw in Dorking, is to get some new car-parking spaces.
"We've had the disabled and parent and child spaces for quite some time," said councillor Hampton Herrington. "We've also recently put in the motorcycle spaces and the bike racks over by the Co-op. Now we will be putting in SUV/MPV spaces."
The new spaces are to be the size of a parent and child space with the picture of the back end of an SUV, complete with rear-door mounted spare wheel to indicate that only SUV/MPV drivers should park there. The public toilet block had to be demolished to make way for the new spaces. Nobody minds this particular loss, as the toilets had been in danger of turning feral.
"We have noticed that there has been an increase in the number of these massive vehicles coming into the car-park," said Herrington. "These behemoths completely fill a standard space. This means when another car parks beside them doors get dented and wings get crumpled."
The new spaces were created after Hillary Dumpleding was trapped in her Nissan Micra between a Honda CR-V and a BMW X-Series. As well as being completely unable to open either door, she could not manoeuvre the car back out of the space either. Mrs Dumpleding was trapped for seventeen hours.
"I couldn't get out," she said. "I wish I'd bought a car with a sun roof now. Fortunately, I'd read of another woman trapped in her car who survived on peanut M&Ms and bottled water, so I'd already stocked up on these lifesavers."
The move by Dorking council has attracted criticism from disabled drivers.
"Being registered blind, I'm a disabled driver," said John Lavary. "And this is eroding our parking space clique. If everybody has a designated spot, that makes ours less special. Plus, I've got an SUV as well, so which spot do I take? It's all too confusing."
