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Desperate times and all that: Space savers come out

Space saver on Bowdoin Street in Somerville

With a whole inch of snow on the ground, people who have to journey out are taking no chances. Brian McFadden shows us how a resident of Bowdoin Street in Somerville's Union Square is making damn sure nobody gets that parking space that he spent several painful hours absolutely no time at all shoveling out.

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Comments

Just toss it down the road.

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Wait and watch, and once somebody's moved the cone and parked the car and gone inside, come out with the industrial-size bag of birdseed to cover the car with.

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Oh Boston, I love you so!

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This is Somerville NOT Boston.

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i could use one of those

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Did it seem like there was a lack of a snow plow response tonight? I went out to pick up pizza a few hours into the snowfall and it looked like a single plow had been down one lane of Comm Ave, no salt/sand dropped, and I saw no plows anywhere on the whole trip. I was out for about an hour and never saw evidence of any work by a plow on any of the major routes I took. Granted this is all going to be gone overnight as it warms up, but I just thought I'd have expected to see something that resembled some snow removal. There were parts of Comm Ave that would dump a less agile driver onto the T tracks (there was evidence of someone sliding into the MBTA curb near Harvard Ave for example).

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I left Beacon Hill going up my hill about an hour into the storm. Nothing to the rode, my little Ford Focus had a hard time and there was a cab that just backed down the hill.

I don't know if it is Walsh, but it seemed to be in the past my street would have a ton (literally) of salt on it at the slightest suggestion of snow.

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I can't believe the city hasn't hired you on as an obvious expert in snow and ice removal. I encourage you to quit your day job. You seem to know exactly how things should be done.

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I'm sorry someone crapped in your Cheerios this morning. I promise it wasn't me.

Nothing in my post indicated what should have been done, only what seemed abnormal compared to past winters. You should probably go beat your dog for a while to feel better about yourself.

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I went from Roslindale to BU for the hockey game at 6 last night. Washington Street and the Jamaicaway et al were black pavement. Brookline, on the other hand, was untreated. Same on the way back after 9, though my secondary wasn't in the best of shape.

This is one of those storms that is odd. I planned on not shoveling the walk until I saw things this morning. Still, it'll all be gone by Monday.

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it was strange indeed. I saw a BC Police cruiser struggle uphill on Foster st towards comm ave on about one inch of packed snow.

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I think they played it right for a light snowfall. Salt and sand and then wait and see if it is worth a major plowing effort, which I may add, is quite expensive. They made the correct call. Save plowing budgets for a real storm.

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It was supposed to warm up, so why bother?

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The Mayor will be having none of that in Somerville.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/regionals/north/2013/02/21/mayor-cracks...

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That article was from two years ago; I hope the mayor feels the same way currently.

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space savers are now banned in the south end (link to Boston globe)

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This is just going to lead to more problems and vandalism. To solve the parking problems associated with snow, the City needs to remove the snow not just plow it around.

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There are no parking problems associated with snow. The problem is that there are about 5x as many valid parking permits as there are street spaces, which means that everyone is entitled to, on average, one fifth of a space (i.e., a space for about 4 hours out of every 24.) But when it snows, some jerks seem to think that entitles them to reserve a space 24x7.

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Last Summer, the Boston City Council enacted Docket 1310, which amends the Boston City Code (16-12.43) to read:

"No person or entity other than the City of Boston and any of its departments or designees shall have the authority to sell, lease, reserve, or facilitate the reserving of any street, way, highway, road, or parkway, or any portion thereof, under the City of Boston's control."

Space savers are banned. Let's see if the city actually has the balls to enforce its own laws.

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Man, it's hard to actually find the text of city laws online. Thezak kind of has a point....

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Not related at all to what we traditionally think of space saving? I know one of the mayor's first acts in office was to reassure a panicked populace he would continue Tom Menino's 48-hour post-storm space-saver rule.

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Whether the legislation was passed in response to Haystack (the parking app), or in response to events on the Mayan calendar, or for any other reason, doesn't really matter; what matters is the text of the law, which does not mention apps, technology, or Haystack; it simply makes it illegal to reserve parking spaces. That would seem unambiguously to ban space savers, no?

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Yeah, I'm sure the city will unambiguously enforce the unambiguous words in this regulation to unambiguously ban space-saving in every neighborhood. Good luck with that.

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Officially banned.

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Guess cone placer guy didn't get the 'banned in South End' memo. To be fair, it could've been a contractor who saved the space -- I've seen them do it in my neighborhood. And no, I don't leave passive-aggressive notes for them nor do I complain on citizen's connect. Knock yourself out if you want to though. Furthermore: yes, I shovel; no, I do not space save; and yes, parking in my neighborhood is as bad as South End.

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