TOO MANY CARS, TOO FEW PARKING SPACES
BY AUGHTRY COOPER
oregonstate.edu/~dragunoa/
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There are definitely little tricks to surviving with a car in San Francisco. When going out to eat, for instance, you can never decide on a place to eat; you find a parking place and then you find a place to eat. It is wild! I have literally driven around for an hour in a location that I wanted to go, then I finally gave up.
I have actually seen the figures on how the number of cars out number the parking spaces- crazy. People park everywhere and they get tickets. San Francisco gets something like 3 million dollars a year just from parking tickets. The cheapest ticket is $35.
My daughter actually got a ticket for $250 for parking in front of the Post Office , like five minutes.
eden.rutgers.edu/~jctang
| I've actually been towed three times. The first was when my in-laws visited for the first time. My in-laws were with me and wanted to visit my wife at her office. We stop in front of the office and I take them up, which takes me only a couple of minutes max. I know the dangers of "tow."
I ran back downstairs and the tow truck was hooking my car to his truck. I pleaded, I begged. "Sorry! The rule is that once you are hooked up, you owe money".
One hundred thirty-five bucks later, I had my car and all the good will of San Francisco was shot out the window for my in-laws. They never came back for another visit.
The last time I was towed
was a real adventure. It wasn't too long after 9-11. My buddy and I were scheduled to go to Vietnam and then 9-11 happened, so we cancelled our trip. He wanted me to get his refund back from the travel agency. I ventured to the guts of San Francisco, i.e., the financial district. The parking was non-existent; however, I saw one space, but it would have taken Russell Crowe in A Beautiful Mind to figure out who could park there. It had about fourteen sets of instructions: if it was Monday, or a truck, or you if had blood type B, etc. Anyway, I took a chance, and could not have been gone more than fifteen minutes. But you guessed it, I got back and no car.
oregonstate.edu/~dragunoa/
| I was so confused: did I park it here, maybe the next street over, finally, I figured out, I had been towed! I whipped out my cell and called the tow number which is listed everywhere or maybe I called the operator. I was so frustrated. Anyway, I finally got through and gave the operator my license number. They don't have it. Oh no! I'm thinking my car had been stolen and I had my computer and a whole parcel of stuff in it. Help. I called the number back and operator asks "Where was your car parked?" I told her and she said, "We wouldn't know, this is San Mateo." What? San Mateo is twenty or so miles south of the City. But, heck, I was so relieved that my car had been towed and not stolen that I was happy.
I caught a taxi to the impound yard only to discover that the tow truck had not even arrived with my car yet. Great. And, then, as I waited, I witnessed the underbelly of the City. It is probably true of any large city, but there were mothers with babies, immigrants, a couple of scam artists and several in this mix that were indescribable; twenty or so people were milling around this dingy room waiting to get their cars out of impound. I felt so very sorry for everyone.
The poor always suffer the most, regardless. Some of their cars were towed because of no registation or expired registration. "How can she work with no car," a mother with two small children pleaded. She was talking to a clerk who had a bored look. The clerk didn't say it or maybe she did, "I don't make the rules."- a midget in the system. The mother didn't elicit much sympathy from the clerk and the fact she had tattoos everywhere probably didn't help.
I did feel genuinely sorry for one family, Mexican I think. They looked so forlorn. They were counting their money. I decided that if it wasn't too much, then I wanted to help out. This was tricky, how would I do this? Finally my car arrived and I paid and left. The young Mexican couple was still there and still looked forlorn.
My car had been damaged while being towed, so I filled out paperwork. For three months I called to see where my claim stood. I finally gave up. They out waited me. The towing company that had the contract for the City had been sued for millions by San Francisco, no less, for scamming them on fees and selling impound cars. What a racket!!!! In some ways, the City and the towing company deserved each other. They were like an extremely dysfunctional family that finally got a divorce.
PARKING ON THE STREET
hi on san francico
| If you live in San Francisco, street parking is no small undertaking. What I've done is make a game out of it. You are only supposed to park on the street for two hours; and, then, you get a ticket, but this is very hard for them to monitor.
You actually can get a sticker if you live in the neighborhood, but what I've done is find a parking spot way away from where we live. Then I run to the apartment; and, a couple of times a day, I check on my car to make sure I don't have a ticket or it has not been towed. Plus, you have to make sure that you don't park in a spot where they do street cleaning. It gives the times and the days, but I never see them doing it. Regardless, by the end of the day, I've logged in a mile or two running back and forth to my car. Plus, every time I'm out which is lots for an ADD guy, eight or ten times a day, I usually check. Great physical training. See some good comes out of everything.
Now, I pay a very expensive monthly parking fee but still keep up the running.
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