I don't know if this was a hire car or not, but hire car companies ought to have a printed sheet of local regulations to hand out to visitors, and councils should make sure their notices and line markings are legible. A stranger can't magically know what Noosa Council thinks.
No. He would have parked facing the opposite way from the driving direction for that side of the street. Then the distance is measured from the correct side where he should have parked.
It would be fine if businesses and government departments had caught up with the spaced out letter delivery. As it is their deadlines for replies remain the same, effectively shortening the time you have to respond.
I was abused once for leaving my dog in the car, parked directly outside the shop window of the small speciality butcher's where I was buying dogmeat, in direct sight of the car and dog. No other shops in that area, nowhere else I could possibly be.
I have used booking.com exactly once, when I could not book directly with a country hotel for technical reasons. The amount charged was excessive and I was given a poor room overlooking the carpark with broken furniture, though much nicer rooms were available at similar prices for guests who...
For those of us for whom an extra ten metres is indeed something to endure, the centre checkouts are a horror. And the area is often not clearly signed, with the entrance area hidden behind tall displays, and then there's a long, tiring snaking queue to reach self checkouts.