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No parking
Sep. 18th, 2006 01:34 pmI think that I've found the maddest page on the entire Internet, and that's up against some pretty difficult competition. Unfortunately, it's the one that explains the parking laws in the city where our new flat is situated.
I found out about this insanity when Alex and Tenaya came over to stay this weekend, and had their car ticketed during the night. It was about $30, which is roughly the price of an overnight car park anyway, but we couldn't understand why it would have been against the parking law - we assumed that it was because it was directly outside the entrance to the building during the night. It was only once I looked up the parking laws that I found out the real reason, laid out in these two paragraphs (definitely the highlight of the site):
Daytime parking: Unless posted otherwise, no driver may park a vehicle on the same street in Brookline between the hours of 6:00 AM of one day and 1:00 AM of the following day (Sundays and public holidays excepted) for a period of time longer than two (2) hours.
Overnight Parking: No driver may park on any street in Brookline, or in any Town-owned off-street parking facility, for a period longer than one (1) hour between the hours of 2:00 AM and 6:00 AM on any day of the week unless allowed by the Transportation Board.
So there's some convoluted formula for parking during the day (which isn't really enforced, as their car was outside for most of the time) and you're effectively not allowed to park overnight at all. Generously, the council provide 76 parking spaces in the entire city for guests to use overnight, at a cost of $10 and a waiting list to use them. Anyone else has to either own their own garage or camouflage their cars during the night so that the street sweeper doesn't notice it.
It could be part of a health or anti-pollution drive, because with these rules, I don't know why anyone bothers owning a car here.
I found out about this insanity when Alex and Tenaya came over to stay this weekend, and had their car ticketed during the night. It was about $30, which is roughly the price of an overnight car park anyway, but we couldn't understand why it would have been against the parking law - we assumed that it was because it was directly outside the entrance to the building during the night. It was only once I looked up the parking laws that I found out the real reason, laid out in these two paragraphs (definitely the highlight of the site):
Daytime parking: Unless posted otherwise, no driver may park a vehicle on the same street in Brookline between the hours of 6:00 AM of one day and 1:00 AM of the following day (Sundays and public holidays excepted) for a period of time longer than two (2) hours.
Overnight Parking: No driver may park on any street in Brookline, or in any Town-owned off-street parking facility, for a period longer than one (1) hour between the hours of 2:00 AM and 6:00 AM on any day of the week unless allowed by the Transportation Board.
So there's some convoluted formula for parking during the day (which isn't really enforced, as their car was outside for most of the time) and you're effectively not allowed to park overnight at all. Generously, the council provide 76 parking spaces in the entire city for guests to use overnight, at a cost of $10 and a waiting list to use them. Anyone else has to either own their own garage or camouflage their cars during the night so that the street sweeper doesn't notice it.
It could be part of a health or anti-pollution drive, because with these rules, I don't know why anyone bothers owning a car here.
