"What $25 Ticket That Is Now $50? I Never Saw A Ticket!"

There's no shortage of head scratching ideas and activity coming out of Hudson City Hall these days (thus Hudseen!), and today's article continues in that vein.  I've offered a lot of insights this year, this one being the final effort for the year 2023.  

You may recall a few recent Hudseen articles about the ten-foot-wide food trailer that regularly parks in the 400 block of the truck route day and night, taking up one-third the width of the street and creating a more dangerous Columbia Street.  It's still parked there, and the City is still okay with the situation.

While there is not the typical overnight alternate side parking rule in the 400 block of Columbia Street, parking on the western half of that block on Thursday nights/Friday mornings is not allowed at any time of the year.  Last night, and for the first time, a Hudson Police officer issued a $25 NO PARKING ZONE ticket to the trailer.  Of course, since trailers have no windshield or windshield wipers, there is no good place to properly secure a parking ticket to them, is there?  Apparently, neither HPD nor the Parking Bureau have ever taken this problem into consideration.  And, apparently, neither HPD nor the Parking Bureau (or, for that matter, the Mayor's Office) care if a $25 parking ticket left somewhere on a trailer falls to the ground and never gets into the hands of the owner of the trailer.

When the officer issued the ticket to the trailer last night, I'm thinking that one of his or her first thoughts was "Where the heck am I supposed to leave this ticket?"  Perhaps their supervisor, or the Police Chief, had told them to leave it anywhere they thought was appropriate, anywhere it might not easily blow away or fall off the trailer.  Maybe no police officers have ever been given instructions about issuing tickets to trailers.  Whatever the case, and wherever the ticket was placed, by 11:00 this morning that $25 ticket that the officer issued very early this morning had fallen into the street and there's a good chance it will never be seen by the owner.

A parked trailer taking up one third of the width of a city street?  Not a problem, even along the truck route!  Issuing a parking ticket to a trailer and not affixing it to the trailer in any reasonable manner?  Nope, not a problem!

There's a lot to scratch one's head about this, but I guarantee you that it would come as no surprise to the parking consultant hired by the city last year to help get City Hall's parking matters in shape.  Without a reliable, centralized parking department, we can expect the goofs and incoherent (and, frankly, sometimes embarrassing) approach to parking to continue  probably well into and beyond 2024.

Happy New Year, and thanks for reading!