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Parking, Southie style
By adamg on Tue, 09/23/2014 - 8:02am
Ryan O. came out of his home this morning to find his car like this, on East Broadway:
The joys of trying to get to work while living in Southie!
He updates that the story had a happy ending: His neighbors knew whose cars those were and their phone numbers and just kept calling them until one finally answered and came out to move his car.
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Comments
wow
Thats an asshole move. Seriously. (not his part, the cars on either side of him)
Eh, that's what you get for
Eh, that's what you get for trying to dock a boat in the city.
What took you so long?
I was waiting for someone to blame the victim. Good old Boston.
@Verbal
Riiight, because something like this could NEVER happen with a SmartCar.
That sucks
That's about the worst I've seen, can't get much more boxed in that that (without someone double parking next to you).
Post updated with happy conclusion
There's something to be said for having neighbors who know everybody on the block.
Yep
One of the great things about South Boston is the sense of community (not all people have this but most do).
I lived in Back Bay for years and barely knew anyone. In the first month I was in South Boston I was friends with just about everyone on my street.
Are we talking about the same
Are we talking about the same southie? On my street it is just a bunch of passive aggressive unsigned notes- no community what so ever.
Maybe I am just lucky..
...but I don't have any of that in my area but my area is full of higher end yuppies and respectful, life long residents.
We don't have any obnoxious frat boys and cranky townies.
- The Original SoBo Yuppie
A bit late, though, eh?
Where was the sense of community when the community members parked their cars in physical contact with this guy's car in the first place?
Getting called out on their terrible parking job and then cleaning up the mess they made themselves makes them sensible community members?
I think this refers to the
I think this refers to the people who tracked the bad-parkers down (and who were presumably not witnesses to the bad parking).
To be fair
I wouldn't call this Southie Style. More like Boston style. Can and does happen just about anywhere in the city.
Guy's patient. I would have
Guy's patient. I would have put it in 4-low and slowly backed up.
moving parked cars
I used to have a big old caprice classic. this would happen occasionally. I would slowly push the car in front of me until it was moved enough for me to get out. on several occasions I was able to push the offending vehicle completely out into the intersection but only if offending car was parked on corner. part of me always wanted to stay to see the face of the person whose car was parked in the middle street and not where they had left it the night before.
What happened ?
A couple of comments just disappeared? Some guy alleged the photo was phony, and Adam asked him to explain. And both posts just disappeared. Conspiracy?
No conspiracy: I deleted them on purpose
Guy made various accusations about the photo taker, including that he faked the photo. I shouldn't have let that through in the first place, but did, answered it, then decided to delete it.
Just another example
of the lack of socialization so many in our society are afflicted with. Me, me, me, me.....I can park here, I can stand here, I can walk down the middle of a crowded sidewalk because I'm entitled, I can take a baby carriage or bike onto a crowded subway train because I'm entitled (why are these 'mean' assholes giving me dirty looks? Fuck 'em).
Regarding specifically parking, Boston (and Cambridge, Somerville, etc.) have a problem: there is not enough room on the streets for all the vehicles to park in many places. It's my understanding the exponential increase in number of vehicles on the road has stopped and reached a plateau, maybe even declining. If it continues to increase, at the very least, more parking garages above and below ground will have to be mandated for new development.
I hope
I really hope that first paragraph was meant to be toungue in cheek
Why?
No, it wasn't.
Better yet
Complete neighborhoods, and transit improvements will make car use less necessary. Throw in a carshare and you reduce the demand further.
Tried and true methods, and a lot cheaper than parking garages.
Hey, don't ruin a good rant
Fix the parking problem and they'll find something else to be selfish about. At least, I think that's the point of the previous comment?
Don't have to
You're right about the plateau / decline, but
They certainly won't have to be. Boston etc. could instead stop giving out valuable street parking permits like candy, either by restricting the number of new permits given out or raising the price so that people think twice before squeezing another car on the street. Or they could adopt incentives to encourage places with off-street parking to make it available for a mix uses, e.g. office parking by day, restaurant parking by evening, resident parking by night. Or they could continue to let people choose whether paying for dedicated off-street parking is worth it to them vs taking their chances on the street.
Scarce parking really does suck, and it's time Boston started having a real conversation about how to better manage it. But mandating off-street parking has hidden consequences: constructing parking garages costs $10,000-$20,000 per space aboveground, and $20,000 to $50,000 (and that's assuming they're built by somebody competent - the MBTA just paid $68,000 per space for an aboveground commuter garage in Beverly). With the price of housing already spiraling out of many people's reach, forcing housing prices higher isn't the answer.
Please chime in
I'd be curious what people would think about limiting resident parking to a single car per address only - tried to park in my neighborhood today and it was crammed - finally did find a space (rare for me - I have parking, but contractor at my home needs to use it).
Perhaps we can't (yet) impose a fee - but should stickers be limited to one per residence - would probably help a lot in those areas where it's one student per room in a house too.
Thoughts?
Carrot and stick
Tax abatements or rental tax credits for residences that do not have a registered vehicle might help, too.
Interesting. I'd personally
Interesting. I'd personally prefer a policy that just charged more for a second or third parking permit (or perhaps guaranteed one permit per household and then auctioned off a fixed supply of permits) rather than expressly prohibiting them. In general, I think softly disincentivizing things like this by making them harder/more expensive leaves people with a lot more flexibility to adapt their particular living situation.
Getting the numbers right is important.
What if we were to determine what is a reasonable number of permits to issue for a given neighborhood -- it would be some small multiple of the number of available spaces, chosen based on real data about how people use their cars, etc., and designed so that a permit holder had a reasonable chance of finding a space most of the time. Then, we give permits by lottery - every car registered to a resident of the neighborhood and garaged in the neighborhood gets a chance. You'd conduct periodic drawings to award the permits, which would be for a period of, say, six months? Maybe you could make the winning tickets transferrable to any other eligible car?
You don't want to be overly disruptive of people's lives -- people need time to plan on having a permit versus not having one.
That plan...
Is incredibly disruptive. So I have to submit to a lottery drawing every 6months. Sometimes I have a spot, sometimes I don't? What do I do with my car if I can't park it on the street. On the east side of Southie, there are 0 parking garages, where do I go for the next 6 months?
If you don't win a space
If you don't win a space, you buy one from someone who did.
Multi-unit addresses?
How would you deal with these? One per unit?
Yes
My building has 7 units - so max of 7 permits for our building - but it also goes for a single family residence and for a residence with 100 units. One per household - even if the "household" is 18 students sharing a house.
We have permitted parking in
We have permitted parking in my neighborhood and parking meters. However, nearly 1/3 of the permit parking spots are always tow zones for one thing or another and contractors which fill each block daily take the rest of the residential spots during the day. Anyone who thinks that a residential parking spot is only available to residents with stickers doesn't live in a congested neighborhood. If you want to complain about your own neighborhood and how you think your neighbors shouldn't have stickers for parking then fine, but to constantly complain about other neighborhoods' residential parking is a bit overbearing.
Being able to hire people to
Being able to hire people to repair and renovate things in your house is a goal which the city government should support.
I do which is why I'm ponting
I do which is why I'm ponting this out!
Come on
You make a poignant, relevant comment about the state of our world and remain anonymous? The baby carriage people are the worst! I don't see many bikes especially seeing as how the new buses are equipped with the bike racks.
Babies are like handicapped
Babies are like handicapped people they can't get around without assistance - hence the need for the carriage. Bikers on the other hand - thought there was a dedicated car ( the back one?)
Classes
I think classes should be given on how to parallel park. And then given again to really ram it home. So many people in the city don't know how to do it and take up too much space (like 1 1/2 spaces in length) when they could certainly park properly in a size-appropriate space. That's the frustration here: many don't park well, reducing the number of available parking spaces.
I know from whence I speak: I did not have to learn parallel parking up in the 'burbs north of the City but I learned real quick-like when I moved to Somerville. And it was not an easy learning curve, believe you me.
And people, it's a city. Your precious bumper will get some scratches on it. It's not the end of the world and if it means that much to you, take the car to the paint shot and they'll paint the bumper for you. Yes, you can get just the bumper painted.
Or... learn to drive?
If you can't pull out of a parallel parking spot without dinging someone's bumper, perhaps you didn't learn to parallel park as well as you think you did.
Yes, the occasion pictured wouldn't allow for it, but that's an exceptional circumstance.
Yes and
You don't get to control who pulls into a spot after you did.
How would classes prevent the pictured situation?
The situation in the picture was not caused by a lack of skill, it was caused by selfishness - Someone decided they were more important than the driver of the car they were trapping. No amount of parking skills would have solved that.
Other cars
The classes would benefit those around the vehicle pictured above. Not the initiator of the article.
I think classes should be
It's called "Driver's Ed". You're supposed to be able to parallel park to get a license in Massachusetts. But as Peter pointed out, this problem wasn't caused by lack of parking ability, it was caused by first-class Massholishness.
Seriously?
The biggest problem with drivers in MA is that parallel parking is the ONLY thing they have to know how to do before getting a license.
Not for me
I might have learned how to parallel park, I don't remember. I just know I didn't have to do it for the test.
For my test I was busy driving stick shift, performing a hill start taking a left onto a blind cornered street (blind corner from the right so I had to feel comfortable no one was coming) out of the old Woburn RMV (or was that Stoneham?). Took a couple of turns off the main drag (Montvale Ave) to a side street, did a 3-point turn and went back.
Done and passed.
Have requirements changed?
Most of my friends weren't required to parallel park and that was back in 2002/2003. Trooper made me do it in my exam but I know of a lot of people who didn't. I would say it's an essential driving skill, especially in the city. Of course, it doesn't matter how good you can park if someone is a dick and boxes you in.
I believe bumpers were
I believe bumpers were created for the express purpose of bumping
"Use the bumper - that's what it's for!"
I read the comment above and could think only of the Russian General (Urmanov?) uttering that line in Goldeneye during the car chase scene in which Pierce Brosnan as 007 gives chase in a tank.
"God I miss the Cold War." -M
Yup
Parking by braille. :)
lol! I was just going to
lol! I was just going to mention the braille method!
If someone wants to bump into my car's bumper then by all means go ahead, that's the least of my concerns with regards to having a car parked in the city! Already had a drunk driver smash into and total my last car which was fully paid off to add insult to injury; then when I got another used car about a month later someone smashed in the side door and window to try to steal it (there was a witness and no I had absolutely nothing of value in the car... not a GPS, laptop, jacket, bag, NOTHING); over the years I've had my yellow paint evidence that cabs had side-swiped me, several keyings for no obvious reason; side mirrors stolen and/or smashed, dings and dents galore, and so on and so forth. The car gets us from one place to another. It's not a precious object nor is it a fancy looking thing, simply a tool to take one to work and back or to visit family or take a day trip somewhere.
cabs aren't yellow in boston
cabs aren't yellow in boston :)
did you perhaps hit the yellow pole at a gas station?
Find a way to mark spots on the streets
Aside from this issue, we also have a big problem with "almost" spots: Where the gap between cars is just too small to fit, and so big that when added up you could probably have a dozen more spots on any given block.
It's gotten to the point on Eagle Hill where I won't leave my house after 9:30 unless I have to, and not just because there's a significant chance I'll be stabbed or machete'd.
Yes marking spots will be expensive, and I'd gladly shoulder that cost as a driver by pay an increased percentage on my excise tax.
And yes, it may be ugly, but I'm sure we can find a way to do it properly in 2014. Except on Beacon Hill. Because they'll cry it isn't 1776 enough.
agreed
Only in city centers do the mark the spots. mostly because of meters but still.
Its a cost to the city(s) to do this but it would help with parking. I can't count how many times I've seen a spot only to have it be just a hair too small to get into or what not.
And yes, the roommate cringes when we have to leave in the evening (or on Sundays when the four churches on our street have service) because we know we'll be parking a few streets away when we get back due to the lack of parking.
So I'll just say that this is
So I'll just say that this is an awful idea given all cars aren't the same size. If you have two Civics and an Escalade, you're either drawing the spaces to fit the largest cars, thus having a ton of unused parking space on any given street, or having these boat-esque SUVs taking up a spot and a half. Rather than wasting a ton of money on an idea like that, which doesn't really even work on paper, it should be a rule that drivers leave a foot on each side.
However, this will always be tough to enforce, so it comes down to people using common sense. That and flagrant violators getting ticketed for boxing people in. Basically, we're going to have to deal with this sort of thing, unfortunately.
Perhaps one day parking throughout the city can look like this. Probably not...
Easy. One spot per Escalade
Easy. One spot per Escalade per every five blocks :-)
"a rule that drivers leave a
"a rule that drivers leave a foot on each side"
The big problem with that rule: how do you know which car to ticket? There's no way of knowing who is to blame because they got there second.
Zoning
This isn't directed at you, personally, it just felt like the right 'area' to place my comment.
I believe Zoning covers size of parking spaces and what percentage. Well, it does for on-site parking. I think they may also specify % of compact vs full size spaces. I guess you could use those dimensions for on street markings? *shrug*
Won't help
1. You would have to make every spot large enough to accommodate an SUV/pickup/large car, so when smaller cars park you will actually lose parking due to extra room in each space
2. After 1 person inevitably parks outside the lines, then every other subsequent spot gets thrown off as well, making it all meaningless
3. It is not enforceable. The city can't employee enough meter maids to go around and make sure every car in every space is parked properly
There is one exception, though, which is angled parking. Most vehicles are close enough in width that marked angled parking spaces actually work pretty well.
Good points but
With #1 and #2 though, we'd be no worse off than before, but with at least a fighting chance of things getting better.
With #3, if they can check every car in resident parking, they can check the lines. Takes just as long to look at a sticker. Also in Eastie, Todisco are VULTURES around street cleaning, and I'm sure they (and other companies) would gladly patrol for the city if it were made a towable offense.
Angled parking is a good idea, but in residential neighborhoods it would be a nightmare.
Waa waa waa
I store my land yacht for free on public property, and this one time I was 15 minutes late for work because I had to ask the neighbors to move their cars!
Parking is tight in Southie, so it makes sense to park close. Most likely the last driver to park next to him didn't realize he was blocked in on the other side as well. He may even be half responsible for his own predicament.
All of these ridiculous Southie parking battles have one simple cause: giving away a scarce resource for free. Charge market rate for parking permits, and apply the money collected to discounting everyone's property taxes, and all of these problems will go away and things will be much fairer.
Parking is tight in Southie,
Regardless of what special-snowflake neighborhood you live in, it never "makes sense" to park so close that the car adjacent to you can't get out. And it's not OK to touch their bumper (as looks to be the case here).
And no other problems will be caused! It's a perfect solution!
Diagonal parking
and adding one-way streets would really help the situation in Southie. I'd say most of the streets are wide enough to allow that. Just keep some of the main streets two-way.
Diagonal parking
and more one-way streets would go a long way in Southie.
That's not "parking close"
That's "parking so that the adjacent car cannot move". When. you park, you must leave adequate space between your car and adjacent cars so that they can get out. You don't get to be a selfish pig and expect someone else to give up the slack for you.
This
is what push bumpers and 4 wheel drive are for.
What a couple of A-holes.
And then there's the opposite problem.
And then there's the opposite problem. I drive up, and find a space, just the right size for my car, in between two trucks. Meanwhile, the trucks leave, and two small cars arrive; the front one happens to park at the front of the space in front of me, and the back one happens to park at the back of the space behind me, leaving my car sitting in the middle of a huge space big enough for two cars.. Then I come back and find a nasty, threatening note accusing me of being a pig for having taken two spaces.
Simple solution
If this sort of threatening note is a common occurrence, pre-empt it by leaving your own note, prominently labeled: To Anyone Who Wants To Leave A Note On This Car. Yes, I parked next to another car; no, I didn't take up two spaces, blame the people who parked after me, and don't threaten me. Photocopy as many copies as you need and stick under your windshield wiper as needed. Oh, and if you will be nearby and want to be a good neighbor, leave your location so that they can get you to move it if the situation you described comes about. Who knows? Instead of them leaving a nasty note and stomping off in a fit of parking rage, you might get someone to chill the hell out and adopt a more reasonable attitude.
Southie Parking
Welcome to my nightmare