I had to go to a different hospital today for a routine check. A 9:24am appointment at Kettering General Hospital was not the most convenient of times to travel but when you get appointments by text which you can't reply to there's not a lot of choice in the matter.
I looked at Google Maps and it said that the journey could take anything between 20 minutes and an hour. I reckoned the hour would be more accurate at that time. I got to Kettering easily enough, although that did require travelling through the wilderness that is now Wellingborough town centre. What a dilapidated state everything seems to be in there. The roads are dreadful but everywhere just looks dirty and shops shut or plastered with adverts and everyone that you do see wandering around looks bedraggled and generally fed up.
Once north of that place, though, things improve and the hospital is on the outskirts of Kettering town so I didn't get to see how good or bad that might be. There appear to be two car parks for the Hospital. One sort of on the grounds and just off the main road but which declares itself to be full. One ponders waiting to see whether someone might emerge and make the sign change to whatever it says when there is a space but with precious little sign of life amongst the cars there I reckoned that may take far too long. I drove on and found myself on a typical trek around a British hospital grounds. Red lines right and left prohibited any thoughts of stopping anywhere on most of the road. Blue 'Assisted Space' places were tempting but I decided to behave, however much I thought I could genuinely claim to needing 'assistance' in finding a place to park if not actually doing the parking itself. I passed them by but was certain that the fine lady getting into a smart Mercedes at one of these blue-lined spaces was not in any way in need of assistance and was tempted once more but continued nevertheless.
Next I came to some places where there were notices on the wall which said something about the space being for relocation or something. I felt quite strongly that I was relocating in many senses and was going to leave the car and hope but decided, once again, to err on the side of bureaucracy and continue looking.
The road ended rather oddly and I had to turn round and go back. One or two hatched sections of road did appeal briefly and I noted them as potential stopping places should life get very difficult and 9:24 more imminent. As it was I had 20 minutes or so left. I came out of the hospital completely and drove across the road to a fairly recently-built housing estate. Right on the entrance road another car was parked and I could see no yellow lines, nor was the place I stopped in anyone's way, blocking any drive or near to any junction. It was a small walk back across the road to the hospital but this seemed a reasonable place for a short while that should upset no-one and seemed legal too.
Then I spotted the sign. £100 caught my eye. It was one of those places where some private organisation has been granted the right to charge people for parking - in other words this was probably an unadopted road on a new estate and not just some random bit of highway. It doesn't need yellow lines, red lines or even 'Assisted Parking' blue lines. If I'm unlucky some bloke on commission will spot me on his daily rounds and slap a fine notice on the windscreen or, worse, a clamp on a wheel. So that was a no-go area after all.
I get back in the car and head back the way I'd come in search of some space somewhere. There were several spots outside people's houses on the other side of the road but these on the grass and probably liable to get me fined by the normal police as the road itself bore double yellow lines. I reckoned I might try to get away with one or two places without blocking a driveway but no opportunity arose to cross the road with traffic piling up behind me and non-stop coming towards me. On I go and then I spot what looks like a big car park on the left.
At the next roundabout there's even a sign for Hospital Car Park A or B so I am hopeful there's a big one here. Turning into this, however, it is clear that the spaces immediately available are for staff and behind barriers and visitors are directed towards an ugly-looking construction on two floors with a barrier entrance at which a couple of cars are waiting with a sign declaring 32 spaces. I pull up behind the waiting cars and eventually they move inwards and I get past the barrier. The signs then loudly declare that only staff can access the upper floor so we visitors are left to negotiate this dimly lit rabbit warren of a construction where goodness only knows those 32 places reside.
A very narrow lane takes you past rows of parked cars. Occasionally there is a space but the size of the space is minute and not something I could imagine getting into without causing considerable delay behind and then, without a sunroof or rear hatch on my BMW Coupé I would be stuck inside anyway. I keep following a vehicle in front in the hope of finding something with a slightly more reasonable degree of accessibility. After some time and considerably delay while someone else attempts to manoeuvre into some possible space I find what I think is worth an attempt. We're talking inches singular here in terms of how close I have to go on one side and I have no idea how the person in the next car will get in their car if they're anything other than sylph-like but I'm in and I can just about squeeze out.
This is an awful place to be with fumes from all the cars trundling around in search of a space really quite objectionable. Indeed, I felt that this exercise was far worse for my health than anything I would normally do in the course of a day, including lying around watching TV and eating chocolate. This was one hospital visit where, without doubt, I would be going away from in rather worse health than I had arrived. More than having to breathe the foul fumes, I was also getting pretty stressed as the time was now not far off the 9:24 when the appointment was due and I still had no idea where to go.
That brings me to the second major problem with Kettering General Hospital. It has signs galore where you can't easily read them or probably don't need them but zero indication of how to find the main entrance, for instance. I do eventually find that but then there are long corridors with signs for this and that but none translated into what I was looking for and which my telephone appointment message described. I asked someone who pointed down one very long corridor and said to turn right and go down at the end. I did that but there was no obvious down until another member of staff dashing from one place to another pointed through a small door which would take me down and, indeed, out into nothing other than a ruddy road with no signs or, for that matter, signs of life either.
I wandered along in a random direction and hoped for some sort of salvation. It was a long time coming but after several turns and guesses I came across a sort of mobile home with a sign matching my appointment description. I was even spot on time too. Except the nurse or whoever was managing the list of expected people did not have my name on it. After some time she realised that I should be in another place. I protested that the message had told me to come here but the 'other place' was just across the road from where we were and also bore a similar name on the outside of the building. There I did finally find myself vaguely wanted and all was well.
A matter of ten minutes later I was out and then began the search for my car. No sign to any Exit, no sign to any Car Park. I tried retracing steps but places look different in reverse and I only managed this with some approximation. It was some 15 minutes later when the car was in sight.
The payment machine - yes, I had to pay for all this awful facility - did work well and my car was recognised at an exit barrier although a sign warning one that you're about to launch into a stream of traffic and not some quiet access route would have been helpful. I am sure there must have been multiple collisions at that point of exit. You can see nothing as you go through the barrier and there is no room to stop on the other side without it crashing down on top of you so the natural inclination is to keep going into the road running horizontally across the exit and kinda hope for the best.
Boy was I glad to get out of there. Driving through Wellingborough town centre wasn't that much more appealing but give me those pot-holed roads and tired shop fronts and miserable inhabitants any day over that ruddy hospital.
