A couple of years ago my wife, Susan and I drove to Maidstone Hospital where my daughter Sarah had an out-patient appointment. The hospital was undergoing building extension works and car parking was ‘difficult’. Having driven around the car park at the front of the hospital several times without finding a space I went to the exit with the intention of going to the ‘more parking spaces’ at the rear of the hospital. This appeared to involve driving along the front of the hospital to the right-hand end and turning left towards the rear. However, the chap operating the barrier told me I could not do this as this left turn was not permitted. I needed to go out and round a roundabout, then come back in. I should then go to the other end and make a right turn towards the new car park. “But,” I protested, “there are cones across that road or I would have gone that way in the first place!” “Those are only across the left-hand half of the road,” he said, “there is room to go round them.” He offered no explanation as to why these cones were there. As far as I could see they served no purpose except to discourage one from driving through to the other car park.
After negotiating this barrier I drove to the new, spacious, parking area.
Having recce’d the rear of the hospital I parked reasonably close to the entrance. Now came the business of paying to park. I walked to the nearest payment meter and having decided that two hours should suffice, inserted the requisite coins. They fell out! Put them back in and yes, you’ve guessed, they were rejected again! As I turned to walk to another machine a lady asked me if I could help her out with change, as another machine had swallowed her money and refused to issue a ticket! So that was two machines out of order, one of which was a thief to boot! Bear in mind this was a new car park and the ticket machines were also new. The next machine was a distance away so I got back in the car and drove to it. This obligingly took my coins and issued a ticket, I then drove back to my selected parking space and we walked to the entrance, which consisted of a pair of automatic doors at the end of a long, new building which extended towards this new car park.
Passing through these doors there extended before us a long wide corridor, fully one-hundred yards in length. This led in to the older part of the hospital and we then had to set about finding our way to the clinic which Sarah was to attend. My readers will all have experience of finding your way around these labyrinthine edifices, so you can imagine that we soon became somewhat tired of the whole business. We eventually found the clinic and began the long wait whilst Sarah went from one room to another, being measured, weighed and assessed in every possible way. She was still waiting to see the consultant when I began to wish I had put more than two hours on the car. Eventually I decided I should go back and put more money in the mugging machine, so I set off back towards the car park. After taking several wrong turnings and finding myself on the wrong floor etcetera, I finally came to the area I recognised and after picking my way through elderly people taking refreshment in the ‘Friends of Maidstone Hospital’ shop I set off on the long walk down the corridor towards the car park, which I could see through the doors in the distance. As I approached the end of this trek I became aware of notices adorning the two doors. I finally reached the end and as I approached the automatic doors nothing happened! That was when I read the notices.
“NO EXIT”
This meant that I had to walk all the way back through the hospital, right to the other end before I could get out to the car park. As my title says, just what you need!