Happy First Day of Street Sweeping Season!

[on-reserve.livejournal.com]

$50. For a street-sweeping ticket. Not for parking in a handicapped spot or in front of a fire hydrant. Seriously? Seriously?!?

This is out of control. I was ticketed at 8:16 a.m. BEFORE street sweeping had even begun in my neighborhood. By the time I moved my car at 8:24 a.m. I hadn't impeded ANYTHING. How about ticketing AFTER the street sweeper moves through and ticketing people who ACTUALLY impeded street sweeping? Oh too much hassle you say? I don't think so. If the city can put people out bright and early to ticket before people move their cars to go to work then they sure as hell can put those same people out at say, 9 a.m. when most working people will have gone for the day and what remains are cars that will likely be on the street all day.

I know I'll be snarked from here to Winter Hill but I don't know why we take this crap. When I moved here in 2000, a street sweeping ticket was $10. $10! Now it's $50. I know MY pay hasn't increased 5X since 2000.

Comments

[ruxxell.livejournal.com]

have some cheese with that whine.

[pushupstairs.livejournal.com]

Does the sign say NO PARKING 8AM TO 12PM? Was your car there between 8:00 and noon?

It's not like the sign is written in Sumerian.

I doubt anyone here will argue the absurdity of this offense being worthy of a $50 ticket, but your car was parked in the street sweeping zone and you knew it.

[pierceheart.livejournal.com]

IAWTC, totally.

[closetalker11.livejournal.com]

Agreed.

[ron_newman]

This was announced here a few days ago.

[on-reserve.livejournal.com]

Announcements, shmannouncements. There's no way that STREET SWEEPING is a $50-level offense. I've gotten parking tickets in BOSTON that were less than that.

[pushupstairs.livejournal.com]

You know what works well? parking on the correct side of the street the day before street sweeping.

I even have it in my calendar, and have an iCal alarm scream and yell at me the night before just to remind me (even though I have a driveway now and have little concern for the sweeping).

[closetalker11.livejournal.com]

Also, you can have the city email you a reminder the day before street sweeping. This helps to avoid the 2-day-in-a-row confusions.

[lissie930.livejournal.com]

I used to live in a neighborhood with street sweeping from 8a-12 noon, and once they did actually ticket me before 8 am. She was putting the ticket on my car as I was getting there to leave for work. Since she'd already issued the ticket, she couldn't retract it, so she told me to go contest it and they'd waive it, which they did.

[ron_newman]

In my neighborhood, I saw cars leafleted last week with notices that street sweeping will start April 1. I don't know if they did this throughout the city.

Also, if the city didn't ticket cars for this, you'd see even more complaints like these, from other residents who think the city should tow cars so that the streets can be properly cleaned.

[ayelle.livejournal.com]

Are you sure you linked to the right article? That's about a drive-by shooting...

[tt02144.livejournal.com]

Welcome to Somerville!!
Welcome to Massachusetts!!
They'll get you any way they can. Sorry, but your idea makes too much sense to ever be considered.
And perhpas if you worked for the city or the state, your salary would have gone up 5x since 2000!!!
Seriously, though, they used to give you a grace period the first weeks of street cleaning. They'd put a reminder on your car instead of a ticket. I guess they realized they were losing too much revenue, because I'm sure they issue the most tickets in the first street cleaning of the spring season! Perhaps they're still trying to recoup some of the 'stolen' money from Traffic and Parking last year.

[on-reserve.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the welcome ... I've lived in Massachusetts my whole life and Somerville for 8 years. I suppose this falls under the "I should have known better" category.

Honestly though? I've had a driveway the past few years. I parked on the street last night so a visitor could park in the driveway. I almost never park on the street anyway.

$50 is just out of control for a street sweeping ticket.

[nonnihil.livejournal.com]

Here's an idea for a compromise: No ticket, but the street sweeper runs over your car.

Me, I'd take the $50.

[pierceheart.livejournal.com]

FTW!

[dent42.livejournal.com]

Be glad its just the $50, pay it, and pay attention next time. Not too long ago they would ticket you $20, but also tow you, so you were out of pocket over $100, AND got to go visit Pat's Towing. I for one am glad they realized that they could make street sweeping parking cheaper for residents AND get more money from the tickets. Its high specifically to be a deterrant. Suck it up.

[ron_newman]

Although, not towing the cars means that the street doesn't actually get cleaned ;-(

[ifotismeni]

April Fools!

Right? Riiiight?

[visage.livejournal.com]

Awesome April Fools' post.

It definitely passes the "realistic enough to fool people" bar, based on the above.

Thanks for brightening my day!

[maelithil.livejournal.com]

We can only hope.

But seriously...

[somertricky.livejournal.com]

...couldn't the city wait until 9 AM to start ticketing/sweeping? Or would this possibly dis-inconvenience too many people?

A number of spots open up betweeen 8:00 and 9:00, but hardly anyone on our block takes off as a habit before 8:00. Also, if you share living quarters with small people, you will find that they really don't have anywhere to go at that hour.

That, and they don't take lightly to having schedules adjusted so they can get up earlier on street-sweeping day (particularly if they don't even get to see the frigging street-sweeper).

I'd actually advocate a stiffer fine if the start time got bumped to 9:00 AM...

Re: But seriously...

[pushupstairs.livejournal.com]

I'd generally agree with that idea. However, the city is going to be the most affected by this since they lose out on street sweeping ticket revenue, and I assure you they are not going to go for that.

[frederic.livejournal.com]

Be lucky that they don't still ticket and tow due to street cleaning violations like they did a few years ago.

[bombardiette.livejournal.com]

So, the fact that you're more pissed off about the cost of the ticket leads me to speculate that you assumed you were going to get one in the first place, you just didn't know how much it would be.

Guess you'll not be doing that again. It would seem that the high price worked.

High Cost Of Free Parking

[secretlyironic.livejournal.com]

You should read this article: http://www.emagazine.com/view/?2418
Which is about this book: http://www.booksite.com/texis/scripts/oop/click_ord/listbooks.html?sid=1624&qkey=high%20cost%20of%20free%20parking

Basically, parking and its associated fines and regulations are *too cheap* and we can tell because too many people park and drive etc.

Perhaps instead of bitching about the parking regulations you should get rid of your car. It would save you a lot on insurance, too!

Re: High Cost Of Free Parking

[on-reserve.livejournal.com]

Perhaps instead of bitching about the parking regulations you should get rid of your car. It would save you a lot on insurance, too!

Thanks Captain Ableist! Not everyone is physically able to get rid of their cars considering the MBTA's abysmal compliance with disability access to public transport.

I feel ya dawg

[rethcir.livejournal.com]

Don't let these commenters get to you. I really don't see why the tickets are so expensive.

Re: I feel ya dawg

[spicysurprise.livejournal.com]

yah. I also go a ticket this morning for $50. and I knew that street cleaning was happening, and got a reminder email, and have lived here for a while, and take full responsibility for forgetting this morning. It still sucks to get a $50 ticket. (please don't yell at me).

does anyone else have REALLY confusing streetcleaning schedules on their street? Mine is cleaning on the even side on the 1st and 3rd Tuesday and cleaning on the odd side on 2nd and 4th Wednesdays. (Couldn't it be the same day of the week to simplify things?) It's a challenge to keep straight- especially before 8am in the morning.

[nathanjw]

You didn't get towed. No sympathy from the Cambridge side of the border.

[duffless2323.livejournal.com]

Cambridge should have sympathy - - we have street sweeping 4x a month and alternate sides of the streets bla bla blah, its unnecessarily confusing. Cambridge doing it once or twice a month is much more reasonable.

Additionally, as person who has lived on streets that are half Somerville and half Cambridge it annoys me to no end that there isn't parking reciprocity between the two cities. Take porter square for example, i've gotten tickets there because I thought I was in Somerville but I was really in Cambridge -but I was there shopping adding to the Cambridge economy - they should honor somerville resident stickers. RANT OVER

[bluedaisy.livejournal.com]

It could be much worse. If you'd waited an hour, they might have towed you (I'm in Cambridge, and we get towed around 9 AM.) which would have been a ticket, a trip to lovely Pat's (or Phil's) Towing, a nice conversation with Pat (or Phil) and $300+.

[c011een.livejournal.com]

i got towed in cambridge a while back, but arrived minutes after my car had been towed. the driver was very nice, explaining "we're not bad people, it's just our job"

in related news, if you're looking to get rid of your car, zipcar is giving a credit of $250 if you donate your car to habitat for humanity.

Would this work?

[righteousness-1.livejournal.com]

In order to reduce the frequency and annoyance of sweeping, parking officers should be able to hand out littering fines and people should have to clean their stretch of gutter like snow removal.

Just my 2c