The Fun Has Begun!

Make no doubt about it, while DPW workers have installed the new scannable parking signs on city-owned streetlight poles along all 9 blocks of Warren, they were getting their orders (or should have been) from the Hudson Police Department as to where those signs were to be installed.  The primary concerns with signs are which streetlight poles (if not all) get them and how many signs are put on those poles (1 or 2).  You don't want too many signs (where they're not needed) nor too few of them (missing where they are needed).  6 weeks ago, the stated plan from HPD Captain David Miller was to have all the signs installed on the tops of parking meter poles.  Then it wasn't the plan. 

Does anyone, including all members of the common council and the mayor, know who the one person in charge of the city's new transformative parking payment system is?  Who is responsible for its proper implementation and success well into the future?  Who decides where and how many signs (or kiosks) are put out?  Who is going to fix the glitches?  Who has the written plan in front of them and is sticking to it?  Who is delegating responsibilities?  Who will take the blame should this entire enterprise fail?  It's difficult to know the answers to these questions; the city's website offers no help.  Thursday's Parking Enforcement Update Announcement (not on HPD's Fakebook page!) has no one's name or even a department associated with it.  The City Officials page includes every department but the Parking Bureau. The Parking Bureau's page is lengthy, but there isn't one personal name anywhere to be found on it.  Phone number, yes.  Name of the person in charge, no.  Who might I want to talk to should I need to call the bureau's phone number?  Might a human answer the phone?  It is as if no one is actually supervising that department. (While the bureau is included on the Departments page of the city's website, it probably shouldn't be.  It appears that the Parking Bureau is now under HPD's purview, not a standalone agency as it was before relocating from City Hall to the police station.)  I was recently told by a HPD parking enforcer that the person at HPD who is in charge of the city's new parking payment program is Police Clerk and recently anointed Parking Bureau Supervisor (Clerk?) Doreen Danforth.  As far as I can tell, the only mention of Doreen Danforth on the city's website is on the HPD page at the end of the long list of contacts where she is referred to as Police Clerk/Parking Bureau.  Parking Bureau what?  Clerk?  Supervisor?  Minister?

With all that organizational mess in mind, let's take a look at which streetlight poles along upper Warren Street someone at HPD told DPW workers to install the small scannable parking payment signs to last week.  Also keep in mind that HPD's parking enforcers resumed issuing $10 meter violation tickets this past Friday after a 6-week hiatus, this time along the entirety of Warren Street, not just the 5 blocks in the middle.  All the necessary scannable signs were in place 4 days ago, facing the correct direction and easily readable and scannable, right?  Of course they were!  How dare you even ask that question!

Here is what things looked like this morning along upper Warren from Park Place to Worth Avenue where the city's black streetlight poles are typically 36 paces apart (about 100 feet), with anywhere from 2 to 6 parking spaces between them, depending on fire hydrants and driveways.  Again, HPD is relying solely on Warren's streetlight poles to post its new parking signs.

On the north side of Warren from Park Place to 8th there are 5 poles (and two hydrants and no driveways).  2 of them have no signs at all; 3 poles have 1 sign only, all of them facing east; none of the poles have 2 signs.  The one sign on the pole closest to 8th Street is not facing any parking spaces, only a long FIRE HYDRANT ZONE and the intersection.  The sign closest to Park Place is obscured by a holiday decoration, making it partially readable and possibly unscannable.

There are also 5 poles on the south side from Park to 8th (with 2 driveways and no hydrants).  3 of the poles have 2 signs (facing opposite directions); 2 of them have no signs at all. 

For both sides, that's a total of 9 signs on 6 poles among 10 poles.  One side of the street has 6 signs, the other has 3 signs.

The sign just east of the hotel is facing their driveway and an extended NO PARKING ZONE to the west.  And what about the next pole 100 feet to the west?

You guessed it, the pole on the west side of the hotel has no signs.  One or two parking spaces lies to its east and a wide driveway lies to its west.

There are 4 poles on each side of the 800 block of Warren, with a total of 5 signs among them.  5 SIGNS ON 3 POLES AMONG A TOTAL OF 8 POLES.  Just one pole (!) on the north side has a sign, and it faces east.  The other 3 poles have nothing!  4 POLES, 1 SIGN.  The south side of the street has two poles with no signs and two poles with two signs each.  4 POLES, with 4 SIGNS on just two of them. 

THANKS, HUDSON, YOU REALLY ARE A BIG HELP!
DID YOU RUN OUT OF MONEY ALREADY?

One sign isn't facing any parking spaces!

The following picture says it all (perhaps more so than the lead picture!):  WE DON'T KNOW WHAT THE HELL WE'RE DOING and we have decided to not pay attention!  The one sign on the pole is not facing any nearby parking spaces.  It was installed facing the wrong f'n direction!  The pole 100 feet to the west has no signs on it! (Was anyone supervising the DPW sign crew?)  Parking enforcers issued tickets on Friday and Saturday to cars parked behind that sign, well beyond that sign!  And they will continue to do so tomorrow as well!

There are long stretches along all of Warren where drivers have no way of readily or easily knowing how to pay for their parking space (or if they even need to).  Why aren't there signs (usually two) on each and every pole right now?  Is it because HPD didn't have enough signs to install before they resumed parking payment and began issuing parking tickets last Friday?  Did they tap out their sign budget?  Or is it because the plan all along was to have no consistency, common sense or logic regarding signage?  Are more signs on the way?  If so, when?  Who decided that some poles should get one sign while others needed two or none at all?  Was it Rob Perry, Mishanda Franklin or Doreen Danforth?  All of them together?  Was it Mayor Ferris (the second most recent parking payment update came from the Mayor's Office and HPD)?  Or could it have been the two DPW workers installing the signs?  It has to be SOMEONE, doesn't it?

That's difficult to know, isn't it?

A scannable sign buried in a NO PARKING ZONE and decoratively obscured:

By the way, it appears this will be another week of free parking on Warren's side streets and in the 700 block of Columbia where I estimate there are at least 140 formerly metered spaces waiting for meter poles to be removed and for scannable parking payment signs to appear somewhere nearby (and up high).  Or really far away.  Or facing the wrong way. Or nowhere at all.  Or never.

A year ago, the meters for those 140 spaces were being filled with quarters (also known as parking revenue) by visitors and residents while parking enforcers were issuing $10 meter violation tickets to cars that hadn't filled those 140 meters (also known as parking revenue).  If someone were to ask Mishanda Franklin, Rob Perry and/or Doreen Danforth when paid parking (and parking revenue) will resume in those 140 parking spaces, what do you suppose their response would be, if anything?  They've got a plan and their sticking to it, aren't they?  They're all on the same page, right?

It's really difficult to know or say, isn't it?