“Collectivité employee”, a status for easier parking

On Thursday morning, the day after the formal establishment of the Zone bleue in downtown Marigot, the rue de la Liberté - one of the main streets concerned by the measure - offered a number of free parking places. Some cars were parked in these places and displayed the famous blue disk on their dashboards as requested by the territorial order of May 30, 2016. Except a few.

Indeed, some motorists are exempt because their vehicle belongs to the Collectivité, as indicated on their license plates. Or at least this is the supposed reason why there is no disk.

Other motorists used another trick to buck the prohibition from simply turning the disk while leaving their car parked in the same place all day long, or even moving it a few meters, which consists in placing the sign «Employé de la COM Pôle…» (Collectivité employee, Pole…) next to the blue disk. On Thursday at noon, two cars were in this situation.

Are we to assume that “Collectivité employee” is a privileged status that implies exemptions? In any case, the order of May 30 does not specify that certain motorists - except people with disabilities and residents - are not concerned by the said measure.

With this kind of behavior, the Collectivité and its employees discredit themselves and become the subject of criticism.