When the circus comes to town

The writing was on the wall - literally. Posters mushroomed all over Victoria announcing that the circus would be coming to town. Location: Bus Terminus, the poster read, but Victoria Car Park is what it really intended.

Victoria's only car park - at least, it's the only open space worthy of such a designation - was no longer available for parking vehicles. In a town with a piteous parking problem, not to mention parking time limits on all streets within reasonable walking distance from its centre, the only available parking space was closed off to house a circus tent.

One could only imagine the havoc this created. Not to mention that those who commute regularly to Victoria are already bearing with silent acquiescence the closure of Triq Gorg Borg Olivier, and the traffic jams resulting from such closure.

On Monday, January 22, the football ground which is used by Victoria football clubs, and is adjacent to the Victoria Parking, was open and used as a makeshift parking area. This seemed only fair, as people had an alternative parking space close to the town centre. On Tuesday morning, the ground was open again, but this time a placard was on display stating that parking your car meant giving a 25c "donation" to Victoria football clubs.

I have nothing against the club making a quick buck, but one wonders whether this is within the club's legal rights on the use of this property. What happens if someone refuses to make the "donation"?

Were this to be within the club's rights, the Victoria council or Gozo Ministry - or whoever is responsible for the Victoria Parking - should immediately come to an agreement with Victoria football clubs to keep the football ground accessible to motorists without fare. In that way, motorists would have an alternative free-of-charge parking space.

Another solution could be to remove the parking time limits around Victoria for as long as the parking area is occupied by the circus. One must note that the Victoria Parking is mainly used by workers who have to park their car for longer than the 90 minutes consented in central areas.

Should a solution fail to materialise, people would have no option but to park at the Gozo Hospital Parking, a good 20 minutes of brisk walking to the town centre, in order to park at no cost or without risking a fine.

The first century Roman poet Juvenal, though alluding to a different kind of circus, wrote in his Satires: "Two things only the people anxiously desire, bread and the circus". It seems that in Gozo we can't have them both!