Monday, November 23, 2009

Crime of the Week

Not guilty, your honor.

Just a couple of weeks after Curbed.com posted a mention of Matt Schrader's video report about the City of Los Angeles issuing street cleaning parking tickets on streets where no actual street sweeping was taking place, I came home from work to find this on the windshield of my car:

L.A.'s new money-maker?


This seems to be a new variation on the tactic mentioned in Schrader's report: TICKETING CARS AFTER THE STREET SWEEPER HAS ALREADY PASSED BY.

I moved my BMW (an old beater, not a new 7er, BTW) into that parking spot at 9:10 am . . . ten minutes after the street sweeper had come by.

Not only did I hear the sweeper go by (I live right upstairs and the sweeper has been on the dot at 9 am for the past 5 years or more), but I also saw the wet tracks from the sweeper brushes as I parked my car in that spot and noticed the nice clean curbside.

Evidently parking officer Franklin (badge no. 2192) doesn't seem to understand that if the street sweeper has already gone by, there's no reason to issue a ticket. Franklin seems to be late on the uptake, or got a late start this morning and decided to ticket cars anyway to make up for lost time.

Note the time the citation was issued: 9:42 am, near the end of the two-hour time slot for street sweeping . . . and in my experience, the street sweeper has never come by twice on the same day.

On average, I get three to four tickets a year, legitimately, and I pay every citation right away. This one I'm going to fight.
at 7:22 PM

6 comments:

  1. Hah - your timing is uncanny... I forgot to move my car last night - and by the time i got up this morning, what do i have waiting for me on my windscreen?

    well, since the ticket is there, no point in moving my car now...

    sigh.
    ReplyDelete
  2. In all fairness, the sign dictates the law, not logic, and while the meter maiden might have easily checked to see that the sweeper marks went straight under your car and not around it, would you expect them to make that much effort? He doesn't know when you parked there.

    But I feel for you.
    ReplyDelete
  3. By the way, I really enjoy your blog.
    But please lighten up on the SCI_Arc bashing...some of us are actually decent human beings and architects!
    ReplyDelete
  4. You won't win if the parking sign states 'no parking between the hours of...' even if the sweeper has already passed; just like you would not win if the sign said no parking between certain hours for no reason at all. It may be ethically wrong, but the sign is legally correct, sorry.
    ReplyDelete
  5. I was abiding by the spirit of the law, not the letter of the law. The City of Los Angeles, on the other hand, is abusing the letter of the law in an effort to extract revenue from its citizens. This is called "gaming the system" for gain.

    On a more practical note, the Parking Enforcement officer usually works in tandem with the street sweeper, as she did this morning (Tuesday, when the other side of the street is swept).
    ReplyDelete
  6. I agree with others here. The sign said No Parking between XX and XX. You park between those times and you suffer the consequences.

    Don't bother fighting it, you're in the wrong and won't win
    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)