This paper is about people's relationship to laws, rules and regulations in a Greek town. The aim is to describe specific traffic policies, point out the underlying pedagogical assumptions and assess their potential effect in relation to the goals of a democratic education. The study springs from the author's experience as a non-native inhabitant of Greece. It is the result of daily, 15-year-long participant observation. Faced with drivers who disregard most rules of the Highway Code, especially concerning parking, the authorities in a Greek town have screwed traffic devices to the ground. Functioning like obstacles, such devices are designed to make violations materially impossible. I argue that this policy eventually teaches people not to respect traffic regulations and rules in general, thus being in conflict with the goals of a democratic education.