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The story
An illegally parked Prius in Shibuya brought a Keio Bus to a 23-minute standstill, sparking a wave of discussion online. On 5ch, users speculated about how much the driver got fined, repeatedly pointed out that there was a coin-operated parking lot just steps away, and one commenter even floated the radical idea of just pushing the car out of the way with a truck. Some argued the real problem was running a bus route down the narrow Inokashira Street in the first place, expanding the debate beyond the parking violation itself into the state of the road.
Shibuya ‘Prius’ Illegal Parking Halts Bus for 23 Minutes — Some Say ‘They Should Face a Damages Claim’ Over ‘Obstruction of Operations’… What Legal Liability Is at Stake? [Lawyer’s Explanation]
8/25 (Tue) 10:01 JST
Bengoshi JP News
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
Like how much of a fine they actually ended up paying
Makes you wonder if it's only a road traffic law violation, unlike trains (which have separate obstruction-of-operations rules)
Probably just got ticketed for illegal parking. Seems to vary by location, but something like ¥18,000 plus points off the license?
Do it like they would in a developing country, that'd be fine
Tokyo
really is garbage, right?
This Prius driver's next-level, sure, but in terms of driving manners, Tokyo's nothing compared to Nagoya or Gifu
Nagoya's entertainment district really is something
Another Tokyoite bashing other regions on pure image again
Check the data — Tokyo's been #1 nationwide in fatal accidents, violations, and bad driving manners all along
I mean, just tow it
Feels like the real problem is making a road like that into a bus route
I think they should just ban regular cars there
They could route the bus through Koen-dori and merge onto Inokashira-dori at the NHK-shita intersection instead
Might already be routes that do that, though
What about your parents' responsibility, lol?
If they stopped making it, those people would just buy some other car
Honestly I want them to keep making the Prius forever
If all the problem drivers stay concentrated in Priuses it's easier to watch out for them — spreading them across other cars would be worse
YouTube work for you?
https://youtu.be/BS6ox7rDpHQ?t=267
Since it's a Prius α (an older, more sedate wagon trim) I figured some old geezer, but apparently they're in their 20s
Looks like it could still get through, though
You could just push it out from behind with a truck, you know
That's picking a fight with every bus company running into Seibu Line stations
You clearly have no idea how local bus routes actually work
Are you serious right now?
If it's a joke, it's not funny
So of course this happens again
There's a big parking lot right nearby
With stuff like this, there's often a parking lot right there that just isn't used
Same here — if you watch the video, there's an open coin-operated parking lot right in front. When the camera pans, you can see it right there
They bring their rural mindset into the city
Yokohama plates, northern Kanto plates, Yamanashi plates, that kind of thing
People from the countryside think paying for parking means you've lost
https://www.j-cast.com/assets_c/2022/06/news_20220614094547-thumb-autox380-227066.jpg
Background and Key Points
The “Prius” in the headline carries baggage for a Japanese audience that doesn’t translate directly: in Japanese online culture the model has become shorthand for reckless or clueless driving, partly from a wave of elderly-driver pedal-confusion accidents involving the car’s automatic transmission. Keio Bus is one of the private operators running fixed routes through Shibuya’s older, narrow streets like Inokashira-dori, roads that predate car ownership on this scale and were never widened for two-way traffic plus a full-size bus. Illegal parking in Japan is normally a flat administrative penalty — roughly ¥18,000 and a few license points, handled by parking-enforcement officers, not police — which is why posters were fixated on that number rather than anything more severe.
The thread’s real disagreement wasn’t about the fine; it was over who structurally caused the standstill. One camp blamed the driver outright, especially once it emerged the illegally parked spot sat a few meters from an empty coin-operated lot. The other camp shifted blame to the road itself, arguing that running a scheduled bus down a street that narrow was the actual design failure, with some suggesting alternate routing via Koen-dori.
What the thread never engages with is the legal distinction the source article’s headline actually hinges on: illegal parking is a traffic-law matter, but forcing a public bus to sit idle for 23 minutes could separately expose the driver to a civil damages claim or even “obstruction of business” (業務妨害) liability — a much rarer, intent-dependent charge distinct from the routine parking ticket posters assumed was the full extent of the consequence.
*This article is compiled as an excerpt and summary of the 5ch (News Speed+) thread “[Traffic] Shibuya ‘Prius’ Illegal Parking Halts Keio Bus for 23 Minutes — Some Say ‘They Should Face a Damages Claim’ Over ‘Obstruction of Operations’… What Legal Liability Is at Stake?”.
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