Would HPD Have Done Anything If They Had Noticed This Illegally Parked Car? The Answer is NO!

On Sunday afternoon, at least 4 minutes after I first noticed an illegally, dangerously and inconsiderately parked car on Warren at 3rd, a woman got in the car with a coffee and a loaf of bread, having just exited the Maker across the street.  

While that car was parked in a clearly marked NO PARKING zone and blocking the painted crosswalk, I watched as two groups of pedestrians crossing Warren avoided the car by stepping out of the crosswalk. I also watched several cars take the turn very slowly and awkwardly from 3rd headed south onto Warren headed west to avoid an accident because of the cramped the intersection. I'm pretty sure that if someone had asked that woman why she felt entitled to park where she did (which I did not get a chance to), she would have responded, "I'll just be a minute," or "I was gone for just a minute." Or five.

When I lived in Chicago in the early 90's, there was a band of people who placed orange stickers on the windows of cars such as this. The stickers were a not so friendly reminder to the driver of how parking illegally is inconsiderate and dangerous to pedestrians, and they were not easily removed from the car. I would love to get my hands on a few of those stickers now!

Did you know that HPD officers in patrol vehicles are not able to write parking tickets immediately upon noticing an illegally parked vehicle? That's right, they do not typically have ticket machines in their vehicles, nor do they have the ability to write a ticket by hand and slap it on the windshield. So, if a Hudson cop passing by on Sunday had noticed this illegally parked car and wanted to issue a ticket, they would have had to drive all the way back to the station to get the ticket machine resting in the battery charger, get back in their vehicle and then drive to Warren & 3rd where there would no longer be an illegally parked car. 

 My guess is that most, if not all, HPD officers a) aren't even looking for illegally parked cars; and b) if they happen to see one, they just ignore it to avoid the hassle of retrieving the ticket machine. In other words, it's a hassle for HPD officers (though not enforcers) to issue parking violation tickets -- even to vehicles that are endangering the lives of pedestrians and making an intersection along the truck route more prone to an accident -- so they don't even bother. If I were a patrol cop, I wouldn't bother either!

Returning to the scene of her crime.

This is one of many ways that City Hall is structured to make our streets less safe than they could and should be. Yet another design flaw, if you will.