Anyone use to grind down the sides of pennies and stick them in those old meters? You'd get maximum time.
More importantly anyone notice that there is now a 30 minute cable show just about meter maids on A&E ro something like that? I watched part of an episode and got disgusted. They were following around officers in Philly. One was a crew of two that drove around neighborhoods in a van putting in everyone's liscence number and if you came up with 3 or more tickets they'd put a boot on your car, and if you had a lot of tickest they called a tow truck. The other segment was about a foot maid who staked out a block and waited for it to turn 4pm so she could give people tickets for "rush hour - no parking." She was literally waiting around the corner for several minutes just to bust people on this one main street.
In philly they would hide in the bushes at the post office wait for people to pull up real quick and drop a letter. They would pounce out of the bushes write a ticket and hide again. They would fill their shift quota in an hour or two and go sleep on the benches in 30th Street.
Those boots aren't cheap to get off either. You usually have to pay all of your past due fines as well as an additional $100-250 fine. Shit is crazy, local gov cakes a lot off bullshit parking tickets.
saying. Last I heard the Muni bus top ticket is like WAY higher than the fire hydrant bus ticket. figure that one out. especially since, as any SF resident will attest, Muni drivers seldom actually pull into the bus stop.
if the fines were really meant as an incentive/disincentive for certain behaviors, then certainly the fire hydrant would be a higher fine (someone could conceivably die as a result of you blocking the hydrant). but clearly it is purely, 100% revenue driven. they must get more Muni stop violations, and so that's the one that's so expensive.
Saying - the issues are more about who puts these ordinances into play to begin with. Meter maids are doing their jobs; they don't write the rules.
The "I'm just doing my job" excuse doesn't fly with me. You do the devil's work. You know people hate you. Obviously that doesn't bother you or you would find a new job, like hangman, executioner, puppy beater, or cat meat grinder.
Saying - the issues are more about who puts these ordinances into play to begin with. Meter maids are doing their jobs; they don't write the rules.
BULLSHIT
The patrolling officer on his beat is the one true dictatorship in America!
This past monday, parking cops were walking up the block writing tickets BEFORE STREET CLEANING EVEN BEGAN.
Then, in what can only be the city running a jack move for additional revenue, they tried to ticket the cars that double parked across the street...*
*in NYC, everyone double parks on the opposite side of the street for the duration of street cleaning. It happens all over the five boroughs and cops usually look the other way. This is so you don't have 10,000 assholes driving around clogging the roads and trying to find new places to park every day around noon.
... unless the driver sat in or by the car. I sat on my hood and ice grilled the hell out of this lady cop. WTF? Like we ain't got jobs or things to do... And, what makes it so bad, the ticket for obstruction of street cleaning is $65... the double parking ticket is $115! So it would've been better just to leave the car in the illegal space.
Now sometimes Sanitation drives around with these big neon green stickers that say "I did not move my car for street cleaning so the street could not be cleaned properly" and those things are a BITCH to get off, you might could even have to buy a new window behind it. AVOID
hahaha this happened this morning on Fell by my house.
the cars on the Southside literally pulled away from the curb one by one as the street cleaning machine went by, and then re-parked one-by-one in its a wake. an entire blocklong-driveway-less-sideof-the-street's worth of cars, me included.
the metermaids are cool in my hood in this regard; technically it's no parking 9-11, but they only ticket right before the cleaner comes through, and don't bother afterwards.
the street sweeping where I park for work is "no parking 8-5 1st tuesday of the month april thoruhg november" and wednesday the other side of the street. 8-5. They sweep that street around 8:30 AM because I always see it when I am getting to work. If you get there after they've swept and park on that street, you'll still get a ticket. It's ridiculous. It's like that meter maid is going out of his way to recheck the streets that were already swept. Assholes!
yeh meter maids are bullshit, when i have caught them giving me tickets I pretty much use that as a chance to go off. I figure i already got the ticket at least I can make them uncomfortable by telling them what I really think of them.
And fighting a parking ticket is about as fruitless as well.. anything. In LA you have 2 maybe 3 weeks to pay or appeal it. first you have to write a letter to LADOT, if it gets there on time then they schedule a hearing. Usually however that appeal date is after the 3 weeks you have to pay it, so now the ticket you are fighting has doubled the fine amount because you didn't pay it within the 3 weeks. Once you finally get to appeal it, if you lose you pay the higher amount. Its a Frickin' catch 22 all the way around.
the worst is when you get a permit to part in a certain area and they still ticket you for NOT having a permit... thats when i gave up and just accepted the fact that thee scum of the earth that are meter maids own the city, no way to beat em.
Oh and whoever said that they can't ticket you for parking at a broken meter might be right in theory but in practice most of the time they will not do it, but shit you get one of those fuckers on a bad day and they will ticket you for being over 18 inches away from the curb AND for parking at a broken meter.
no thanks. As if I need another errand, writing appeals letters.
LOL @ writing appeal letters for parking citations.
Why is that funny? It's worked for me several times.
A) Seems like a lot of effort for a $15-20 ticket that doesn't affect your record or insurance.
B) Every state I have lived in, you just go to the traffic court magistrate's office and ask for a pass and they'll do it a couple times for you.
So in your opinion it's easy to go to a municipal building and have to talk people into dismissing the ticket, but taking 5 minutes to write and mail an appeal is a laughable and frivolous waste of time?
I got an "expired meter" ticket for an unmetered loading zone, while doing a delivery I do all the time in my commercial plated truck. Next time through I just took a photo of the loading zone, mailed it in with the ticket saying "this is where I really was" and voila, no $40 out of my pocket.
Slightly related: looking ahead, what's utter bullshit is how L.A. is greenlighting all kinds of development projects that will increase population but few of these have taken into account the impact on parking and traffic. People think shit is bad now? Give it a decade or so.
no thanks. As if I need another errand, writing appeals letters.
LOL @ writing appeal letters for parking citations.
Why is that funny? It's worked for me several times.
A) Seems like a lot of effort for a $15-20 ticket that doesn't affect your record or insurance.
B) Every state I have lived in, you just go to the traffic court magistrate's office and ask for a pass and they'll do it a couple times for you.
So in your opinion it's easy to go to a municipal building and have to talk people into dismissing the ticket, but taking 5 minutes to write and mail an appeal is a laughable and frivolous waste of time?
Really, I'm saying I've always just paid my shit. I guess you're right though. Just as easy to write a letter. I work blocks from the municipal building that you pay your tickets at though, so it's simpler for me to go talk to them than it is to go get a stamp and write a letter.
Really, I'm saying I've always just paid my shit. I guess you're right though. Just as easy to write a letter. I work blocks from the municipal building that you pay your tickets at though, so it's simpler for me to go talk to them than it is to go get a stamp and write a letter.
Word. I've only ever fought the big $$$ ones or the ones from my work truck where I don't want to take shit from my boss. Cambridge, MA now has internet appeals - you just go to the website and enter your appeal in the box and press send. Now THAT it is something I can get with. I'll fight a $5 ticket with an internet appeal, LOL.
My worst experience with a meter maid was one I was in a copymat and saw the meter maid coming down the street. I ran out and threw in some change because my meter had expired. I walk back into the store and turn around to see the maid pull up to my car and write me a ticket. I ran out there screaming at the guy telling him I knew he saw me paying the meter before he got to my car. He shrugged his shoulders and said I hadn't paid when he saw my car coming down the street, and then he drove off as I was yelling at him. Then I look at the car in front of me and that guy's meter had expiried, but the maid didn't give him a ticket.
Fuck these assholes. Once I went to a party in the hills and drove around for 30 goddamn minutes looking for a clean spot. Finally found one a good 3/4 mile from the party, but walk that happily secure in the knowledge i could expect a ticket free night. I walk back to my car at the end of the night to a 40 dollar or so ticket. why? the ticket stated that i parked THIRTY SIX INCHES AWAY FROM THE Frickin' CURB. THIRTY SIX INCHES. Thats the middle of the damn street in the hills, bitches are narrownamotherfucker. I couldnt have been more than eight or nine inches from the curb. Jesus.
the rule they need to enforce but don't: curbing your wheels on a hill. we got some steep as hills and I know a lot of the muhfuckahs aren't pareking in gear or using their emergency breaks. into the curb if facing downhill; away from the curb if facing uphill.
then again I've never seen a runaway car or anything...I just think of all the inane regulations they DO enforce, this one at least makes sense and I never see anyone with a ticket for not doing it (and plenty of fools don't do it).
the rule they need to enforce but don't: curbing your wheels on a hill. we got some steep as hills and I know a lot of the muhfuckahs aren't pareking in gear or using their emergency breaks. into the curb if facing downhill; away from the curb if facing uphill.
then again I've never seen a runaway car or anything...I just think of all the inane regulations they DO enforce, this one at least makes sense and I never see anyone with a ticket for not doing it (and plenty of fools don't do it).
I live on a hill and I honestly don't think curbing your wheels makes a bit of difference. runaway car? its not the 1920s. I'm not even sure its possible for a car to "run away" if its in "park". And if its a stick, parked in neutral, the car would start rolling back before the driver even had the chance to get out, so its not like he would leave and then all of a sudden the car would start rolling backwards.
Really, I'm saying I've always just paid my shit. I guess you're right though. Just as easy to write a letter. I work blocks from the municipal building that you pay your tickets at though, so it's simpler for me to go talk to them than it is to go get a stamp and write a letter.
Word. I've only ever fought the big $$$ ones or the ones from my work truck where I don't want to take shit from my boss. Cambridge, MA now has internet appeals - you just go to the website and enter your appeal in the box and press send. Now THAT it is something I can get with. I'll fight a $5 ticket with an internet appeal, LOL.
Now that's what I'm talkin' about. It would be about as easy as posting a message up on Soulstrut! Haha.
the rule they need to enforce but don't: curbing your wheels on a hill. we got some steep as hills and I know a lot of the muhfuckahs aren't pareking in gear or using their emergency breaks. into the curb if facing downhill; away from the curb if facing uphill.
then again I've never seen a runaway car or anything...I just think of all the inane regulations they DO enforce, this one at least makes sense and I never see anyone with a ticket for not doing it (and plenty of fools don't do it).
I live on a hill and I honestly don't think curbing your wheels makes a bit of difference. runaway car? its not the 1920s. I'm not even sure its possible for a car to "run away" if its in "park". And if its a stick, parked in neutral, the car would start rolling back before the driver even had the chance to get out, so its not like he would leave and then all of a sudden the car would start rolling backwards.
Comments
i just dont even pay them. i usually just throw the ticket off my window and cruise off.
You're gonna end up with the Denver Boot one of these days. Wait, where do you live, Iowa? Maybe they don't do that there.
More importantly anyone notice that there is now a 30 minute cable show just about meter maids on A&E ro something like that? I watched part of an episode and got disgusted. They were following around officers in Philly. One was a crew of two that drove around neighborhoods in a van putting in everyone's liscence number and if you came up with 3 or more tickets they'd put a boot on your car, and if you had a lot of tickest they called a tow truck. The other segment was about a foot maid who staked out a block and waited for it to turn 4pm so she could give people tickets for "rush hour - no parking." She was literally waiting around the corner for several minutes just to bust people on this one main street.
I hate Meter Reader assholes.
if the fines were really meant as an incentive/disincentive for certain behaviors, then certainly the fire hydrant would be a higher fine (someone could conceivably die as a result of you blocking the hydrant). but clearly it is purely, 100% revenue driven. they must get more Muni stop violations, and so that's the one that's so expensive.
The "I'm just doing my job" excuse doesn't fly with me. You do the devil's work. You know people hate you. Obviously that doesn't bother you or you would find a new job, like hangman, executioner, puppy beater, or cat meat grinder.
BULLSHIT
The patrolling officer on his beat is the one true dictatorship in America!
This past monday, parking cops were walking up the block writing tickets BEFORE STREET CLEANING EVEN BEGAN.
Then, in what can only be the city running a jack move for additional revenue, they tried to ticket the cars that double parked across the street...*
*in NYC, everyone double parks on the opposite side of the street for the duration of street cleaning. It happens all over the five boroughs and cops usually look the other way. This is so you don't have 10,000 assholes driving around clogging the roads and trying to find new places to park every day around noon.
... unless the driver sat in or by the car. I sat on my hood and ice grilled the hell out of this lady cop. WTF? Like we ain't got jobs or things to do... And, what makes it so bad, the ticket for obstruction of street cleaning is $65... the double parking ticket is $115! So it would've been better just to leave the car in the illegal space.
Now sometimes Sanitation drives around with these big neon green stickers that say "I did not move my car for street cleaning so the street could not be cleaned properly" and those things are a BITCH to get off, you might could even have to buy a new window behind it. AVOID
the cars on the Southside literally pulled away from the curb one by one as the street cleaning machine went by, and then re-parked one-by-one in its a wake. an entire blocklong-driveway-less-sideof-the-street's worth of cars, me included.
the metermaids are cool in my hood in this regard; technically it's no parking 9-11, but they only ticket right before the cleaner comes through, and don't bother afterwards.
And fighting a parking ticket is about as fruitless as well.. anything. In LA you have 2 maybe 3 weeks to pay or appeal it. first you have to write a letter to LADOT, if it gets there on time then they schedule a hearing. Usually however that appeal date is after the 3 weeks you have to pay it, so now the ticket you are fighting has doubled the fine amount because you didn't pay it within the 3 weeks. Once you finally get to appeal it, if you lose you pay the higher amount. Its a Frickin' catch 22 all the way around.
the worst is when you get a permit to part in a certain area and they still ticket you for NOT having a permit... thats when i gave up and just accepted the fact that thee scum of the earth that are meter maids own the city, no way to beat em.
LA will make you PAY
So in your opinion it's easy to go to a municipal building and
have to talk people into dismissing the ticket, but taking 5 minutes
to write and mail an appeal is a laughable and frivolous waste of time?
I got an "expired meter" ticket for an unmetered loading zone,
while doing a delivery I do all the time in my commercial plated
truck. Next time through I just took a photo of the loading zone,
mailed it in with the ticket saying "this is where I really was"
and voila, no $40 out of my pocket.
i fuckin' hate this rule.
Really, I'm saying I've always just paid my shit. I guess you're right though. Just as easy to write a letter. I work blocks from the municipal building that you pay your tickets at though, so it's simpler for me to go talk to them than it is to go get a stamp and write a letter.
Word. I've only ever fought the big $$$ ones or the ones
from my work truck where I don't want to take shit from my
boss. Cambridge, MA now has internet appeals - you just go
to the website and enter your appeal in the box and press send.
Now THAT it is something I can get with. I'll fight a $5 ticket
with an internet appeal, LOL.
then again I've never seen a runaway car or anything...I just think of all the inane regulations they DO enforce, this one at least makes sense and I never see anyone with a ticket for not doing it (and plenty of fools don't do it).
I live on a hill and I honestly don't think curbing your wheels makes a bit of difference. runaway car? its not the 1920s. I'm not even sure its possible for a car to "run away" if its in "park". And if its a stick, parked in neutral, the car would start rolling back before the driver even had the chance to get out, so its not like he would leave and then all of a sudden the car would start rolling backwards.
I think its a myth.
Now that's what I'm talkin' about. It would be about as easy as posting a message up on Soulstrut! Haha.
BITCH YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT A HILL LOOKS LIKE.
as a result, all of the meters are now gone and replaced w/ some sticker machine. it's wack.