That’ll teach him.
A motorist in Northern Ireland has been fined a whopping £4,000 (approximately €5,058) after being caught using bus lanes in Belfast 91 times over a ten-month period.
Since last summer there has been a crackdown on the illegal use of bus lanes in Belfast, with fixed and mobile CCTV cameras capturing the unauthorised use of bus lanes in numerous locations across the city.
According to the Belfast Telegraph, more than 40,000 vehicles have been caught using bus lanes in the city without authorisation in the past ten months, clocking up fines in excess of £1.5 million (approximately €1,896,700) as a result.
One unidentified motorist has been caught using bus lanes in the city 91 times in ten months (around once every three days), accumulating fines worth £4,000 in the process.
Though it has generated a significant amount of revenue for the Department for Regional Development (DRD) in Northern Ireland, the ultra-strict approach has been questioned, with fears that it may be affecting retail trade in Belfast city centre.
Ukip’s Northern Ireland leader David McNarry, meanwhile, labelled the system as “nonsensical and abusive”.
“It seems we have serial offenders, and the reason is pretty clear – you can’t travel through our beloved city without falling foul of this nonsensical and abusive restriction on motorists,” McNarry is quoted as saying in the Belfast Telegraph.
