Homeless in Vancouver: Parking or parkour on West Broadway?

If our fine feathered friends also went in for photography—if they were not just eaters of bugs but shutterbugs also—then the early bird would get the worm and some pretty interesting photos.

This was my thought early Saturday morning (September 3), at about 7:45 a.m., when I was, myself, quite the picture of frustration.

I was finding it nigh on impossible to lock my bicycle and trailer up to the “No Parking” sign that I habitually use for that purpose on the south side of the 1400 block of West Broadway.

The difficulty was the Ford Escape crossover that was parked under the sign—it was under the sign and on the road (where it shouldn’t have been) and it was also up ON the sidewalk!

This guy couldn’t even drive a nail straight, I bet!

I wondered idly if it wasn’t more parkour than parking. Parkour being that most-French of sports, where athletes treat the urban landscape as an obstacle course and dash from point A to point B, while finessing their way over anything in their path.

The driver derailed my train of thought when he appeared from the direction of the nearest gas station armed with both a red gas can and quite an attitude. He immediately accused me of trying to break into his vehicle.

He and I had quite a discussion about what he thought and about his judgement in general, as well as his driving skills and how all those things were of a piece.

Unfortunately, our voices were raised to such a level that we woke up my friend Daryl, who’d been sleeping just a few feet away beside his shopping cart, under the shelter of the glass and steel awning of a furniture store. (Sorry Daryl.)

Of course, the Escape was parked illegally, and dangerously and ridiculously, to boot. But the driver just couldn’t see it that way. (How he ever passed a driving test with such faulty eyesight is a mystery.)

Brandishing his gas can expressively, the fellow, at one point, changed tack and declared that he had been run off the road. Rather than showing sympathy, I just retorted that he hadn’t been run off the road far enough for my comfort.

Run off the road or not—he had apparently run out of gas. While I lobbed discussion points at him from the curb he tried to return them from the other side of his vehicle, on the roadway, while he poured the contents of the red gas-can you-know-where.

Or tried to pour, at least. After he had finally driven off, I saw that he had actually managed to miss his gas tank and spilled a substantial amount of his gasoline on the road.

Let’s see, he probably couldn’t colour inside the lines if he wanted to when he was a kid. I wouldn’t trust him to stay in his lane on the road and I wouldn’t want to be riding my bike anywhere near him. And I certainly wouldn’t want to use any men’s room just after he’d used it to pee!