White van man is in the red with £9,000 of parking fines

A WHITE van man is being chased for more than £9,000 worth of unpaid parking fines which have been racked up in less than a year.

The driver has collected 160 tickets since last August and seven in the last week alone, making him the Capital's biggest parking cheat.

He tops a list of the city's ten worst offenders who have accrued more than 500 unpaid 60 tickets between them in the last year, adding to an overall burden that is costing the city around 3 million.

Council bosses have so far failed to collect any money from the driver and the case is now understood to be in the hands of the courts.

• Should the council clamp the vehicles of the worst parking fine dodgers?

It is believed attempts to seize his vehicle have so far failed because it is used for work purposes.

The majority of the fines have been issued while the vehicle, a white Ford Transit, is parked in Murdoch Terrace, Fountainbridge.

One resident of the street said the van was "well-known" in the area and was "parked there willy nilly all the time", often not even in a proper space.

Another neighbour said motorists living in the street were "sick" of it.

"He parks it anywhere he wants, in permit-holders-only zones and pay and display areas and doesn't seem bothered about getting tickets," they said.

"People here are just sick of it. We didn't want permits here in the first place and this guy is just flouting the system everyone else seems happy to adhere to.

"And what else seems to be a main gripe of the neighbours is that he will park the van right in the middle of two spaces which limits the parking allocation for everyone.

"So if he parks in the permit-holder section, when legitimate permit-holders drive home and there's no space left they have to shell out a few pounds to stay in the pay and display area."

He added: "It seems there is nothing anyone can do about it. He gets ticket after ticket but I've never seen the van clamped or taken away."

The case emerged a day after the Evening News revealed how Edinburgh has a backlog of more than 55,000 unpaid parking tickets.

New clamping rules are set to come into force in the city later this year which will see cars immobilised and their owners hit with a 70 bill.

Ultimately, the parking cheats could see their cars scrapped if they fail to pay up.

The money owed is cash which would be spent as part of the city's transport budget, possibly helping tackle the city's 86m pothole backlog.

Neil Greig, a spokesman for the Institute of Advanced Motorists, said the city's top ten worst offenders should be "hit with the full force of the law".

He said: "These are the sort of people who all normal drivers want to see targeted. They are the ones who should have their vehicles clamped and towed.

"You would have thought Edinburgh might have had this particular driver by now, but I have no problem with them hitting him with all the powers at their disposal."