KEY POINTS:
Motorists will have to be extra quick getting back to their cars if they want to avoid a ticket - some Auckland City parking wardens are now whizzing about on two-wheeled battery-powered scooters.
Segway "personal transporters" - banned on San Francisco footpaths because of safety concerns - are being tested as an eco-friendly way of bringing wardens "into the future" and improving their "business performance".
An evaluation of the trial will eventually go to a council committee - but it is unlikely to receive much support from Mayor John Banks.
"It's a silly idea for parking wardens to be using these when they need to be out and about in a user-friendly way enforcing street parking with a bit of grace and dignity," he told the Herald.
"I would be horrified if a very nice elderly woman was knocked down and her hips and legs broken by one of these contraptions by presumably a lazy parking-meter warden racing around in a circle on this."
Council parking marketing manager Justine Martins said the Segways were one of several options being considered by department staff, who were "innovators and leaders in the field of parking services".
"We are constantly looking at new ways in which we can increase our service to our customers as well as improve our business performance and efficiency."
But Mr Banks has made it clear that the Segways - which cost up to $12,000 each - won't be getting any council money if he has anything to do with it.
"The Auckland City Council is not going to spend one dollar funding them because we are much more interested in cleaning up the CBD than in cleaning up pedestrians with parking wardens on Segways.
"They might be rather novel for a very large warehouse operation, to zip the people around the aisles, but on the streets of Auckland at the very least they would be seen as a terrible waste of ratepayers' money and at best council officers becoming lazy."
Asked why parking wardens would need to be on Segways, Mr Banks replied "they don't need to be, and won't be".
Mr Banks said he presumed the Segways were being tested at no cost, but he would be looking into it further today.
"I will be making some inquiries as to why do we get into these things that draw unnecessary and unwanted attention to the Auckland City Council.
"It's just another one of those silly ideas whose time hasn't arrived. I would be appalled if they had spent money on these things."
Mr Banks said young skateboarders were criticised for whipping around Auckland's streets, so it would be hypocritical to allow parking wardens to do the same.
"I have never seen a parking warden in anything that resembles a hurry - why is there now a need for haste?"
Segway director Philip Bendall said the transporters were on trial at no cost in several council departments.
* WHAT A PICTURE
The picture above was taken by Brett Phibbs, judged "photographer of the year" at the annual Qantas Media awards.
At the awards ceremony on Friday night, the New Zealand Herald was crowned New Zealand's best daily newspaper.
The judges said it was "a superb package - a big paper, well written, well laid out, with a portfolio of strong pages, allied to a campaign which won it no favours from the government of the day - not necessarily a bad thing for a newspaper".
The Herald also won the award for the best front page with a portfolio of front pages described by the judges as "clear, clean, uncluttered standouts which commanded 'read this' ".
For the second year in a row the Business Herald was judged best business section, and the Tuesday Travel section won the award as best in its class for the fourth year in a row.
