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Boston residents: Get e-mail the day before you have to move your car for street sweeping
By adamg on Tue, 04/07/2009 - 10:01am
A handy city service if you can't remember when to move your car.
Via Alison F.
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Comments
If I recall there was a big
If I recall there was a big issue when a newspaper offered the same service and the system crashed, obviously the city was not responsible for that and people got tickets etc. I wonder if the city of Boston stands by this system, and in the event of a malfunction would refund money expended on your towed car? It will be interesting the first time this happens.
I highly doubt it since the
I highly doubt it since the responsibility is ultimately on the car owner to remember. But it would be worth appealing no doubt to try.
It's basically another way to increase their ticket revenue
I've been signed up for the Boston.com street sweeper notification for a couple years. It always alerts me correctly, without fail. (Not saying it didn't screw up that one time, just that I've never had an issue with it). The best part is that the subject line is "the street sweeper cometh."
Last week I signed up for cityofboston.gov's e-mail alerts. Yesterday, both alerts showed up. The Boston.com one was correct. The city's "official" one said sweeping was on the odd side of the street today, when it's on the even side.
The city's e-mail has a clear disclaimer stating that if the e-mail differs from the signs, the e-mail is wrong, and one should always defer to the signs. Duh, but good of them to put it there for the sake of the no-personal-responsibility crowd.
Interestingly, the listing on the city's actual site has my street's correct street sweeping schedule. I'm wondering if they purposely screwed up the e-mails so they could issue tickets.
A much more useful city service would be
to give residents vouchers to use private parking garages on street sweeping days.
Oh wait, that would make too much sense. What was I thinking?
How would it make sense? You
How would it make sense? You knew going in when the street was swept, if that was a problem then you live in the wrong area. Why should non car owners pay for your weekly visit to the parking garage? Also how would that affect the prices of local parking garage as they filled up faster the night before?
Given that the City is forcing residents to move their cars
so they can sweep the street, and given that finding parking on City streets is already difficult on a good day (as I've been told by many people), it makes perfect sense that the City should provide these residents with an alternate place to park their cars in the short term.
I only mentioned vouchers for private parking lots because it seems that's what the City always forces Hollywood production companies to do when they even take FOUR parking spaces for half a day. If the City has excess capacity in their free lots (which IMO should be available to drivers anyway), all the better.
Given that streets are city property ...
One would think you should be thankful that all the other taxpayers let you park for free the rest of the month?
No? Then get your own driveway and make your own rules. Beggars can't be choosers.
Live someplace where there
Live someplace where there is more parking... simple I solved your problem. I would love to live in Boston, really I would it would make my life so much easier. There are two problems, one is price and one is parking. I need a car for work, and I dont make enough to afford the rents in the nice parts of Boston so that leaves me living out in the very close suburbs. If the mayor were to start handing out free parking vouchers, then maybe he will hand out rent controlled apartments too!
Who would pay for this?
and if your answer is "the city", why should other taxpayers pay for it?