Bruce Springsteen gets fined for parking outside a venue he opened

We can all breath a sigh of relief; Bruce Springsteen won’t have to pay the parking tickets that were left on his buses and vans when he played the Leeds Arena’s inaugural show on Wednesday night.

The Boss got left eventually, however, off not with a warning but an apology. The Leeds city council have apologised to the musician for the “embarrassing” and very much awkward incident that took place earlier this week at the brand new festival arena.

“It was somebody being a little bit stupid and zealous,” Keith Wakefield, Labour leader of Leeds Council, told BBC News. Apparently wardens got a bit carried away patrolling the area, slapping tickets on lorries, vans and buses that were there were there for the Born in the U.S.A star himself.

“We accept this is a little embarrassing but the attendant was doing his job – if a little too efficiently,” said a council spokesman. “When you prepare a city to open and host a huge, state-of-the-art new venue, you’re bound to get the odd teething trouble … Having considered the special circumstances, tickets were quickly cancelled.”

Traffic officers told ITV that even if there were no other spaces available, no-one, not even roadies, were not allowed to park on double yellow lines. However, it has since been discovered that these tickets are now also expected to be waived.

13,500-strong crowd gathered to watch Springsteen’s big show earlier this week – the first performance at Leeds’s brand new £60m venue, which doesn’t officially open until 4 September.

[via The Guardian]