They say Annapurna in the Himalayas is the most dangerous mountain in the world to get down from in one piece.
With a fatality rate of more than 30%, it means one in three adventurers don’t make it back alive.
It’s obvious to me that researchers have never descended from the peak of the multi-storey car park at Foresterhill medical complex in Aberdeen. The stress levels there can also seem mountainous.
After my recent descent from level 12, I started to think they should stick defibrillators and oxygen on each ramp, just in case.
Come off it, I hear you say, that’s nothing like Annapurna. Fair enough, but my roundabout trip downwards the other day would give The Crystal Maze a run for its money.
There is something odd about the current confusing directions in and out of the 13-storey Lady Helen parking block. It’s due to the fact that they have been changed around and tinkered with; the old markings obscured, but still clearly visible.
With a shudder, they reminded me of the hopeless rubbings-out on my technical drawing board at school all those years ago – a blueprint of repeated failure that was never quite right.
Navigating the car park has become a chore
As I drove into the car park, it looked like another visitor was being personally guided out by a yellow-coated attendant. He walked slowly in front of the car like one of those funeral directors who leads a cortege.
It’s just that the signage is still hard to follow. One minute, you are turning left after going down ramps between floors, then, the next, it’s right.
Sometimes you are directed away on a circuitous loop – like sprinting off in the 400 metres at school – before arriving back to virtually where you started from on the same floor to access the next ramp.
Old white arrows are painted-over on the ground, but look ominous as black arrows – especially as we are now instructed to drive against them – and nobody seems to know when to give way.
You’d think the nearby casualty unit would be kept busy by this harum-scarum, but friendly marshals in yellow are positioned at pinch points to keep everyone straight.
I eavesdropped on a couple of bystanders scratching their heads. One said with some authority: “This was all changed by German consultants who were brought over to redesign the markings. The trouble is, they usually work with left-hand cars and drive on the right.”
That’s a hell of a conspiracy theory; it can’t be right, can it?
Look, allow me to put the record straight.
How much parking space is enough?
I should offer a disclaimer at this juncture to avoid a heap of abuse coming my way. Yes, I applaud and admire the magnificent act of philanthropic foresight by the Wood family to build a £10 million car park for the exclusive use of patients and visitors.
We have now reached the sixth anniversary of its completion and naming, in honour of Lady Helen Wood. It immediately resuscitated a chronic lack of adequate parking around Aberdeen Royal Infirmary (ARI), at the heart of Foresterhill.
Finding a free bay in the multi-storey might, at times, seem as daunting as securing a bed in ARI
I just thought it was worth bringing up with the anniversary in mind, and to see what other users thought.
In fact, the car park’s current issues felt like a metaphor for the ills of the NHS. Finding a free bay in the multi-storey might, at times, seem as daunting as securing a bed in ARI.
I was stressed after abandoning my temporarily disabled wife on a bench at ground level and then running back down for her appointment after finding space on the 12th floor.
NHS staff aren’t happy with their (parking) lot
NHS staff aren’t happy with their parking lot either, if you forgive the pun.
I wasn’t surprised that the Woods received universal praise for their rescue act. Lady Helen’s personal knowledge of stressed-out patients and visitors at their wits’ end over parking nightmares was a driving factor.
But it wasn’t long before covetous eyes were casting envious glances at the shiny new car park. NHS staff, for a start.
It’s claimed paucity of staff parking spaces forces them to arrive hours early to secure spots.
Staff managed to temporarily requisition upper floors of the car park during the worst of the Covid pandemic, and this arrangement is still in place. But they petitioned health bosses recently to make it permanent.
I didn’t realise until I saw a sign outside the entrance that NHS staff and students currently have access to all floors above level six. More than half of the multi-storey, in other words.
I understand frustrations on all sides, but this dilutes the ethos of the original project.
Union leaders speaking loudest over securing permanent staff rights to the public’s “exclusive” car park don’t mention patients and visitors who have no voice. How long before unions inevitably demand permanent access to the whole block?
Lady Helen gave the little people their voice – and we mustn’t forget why.
David Knight is the long-serving former deputy editor of The Press and Journal
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