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Mayor Bloomberg has announced that the city will crackdown on the abuse of parking permits issued to civil servants, reducing the overall number by 20%. The change comes after the Post revealed in November that “149 separate government entities had qualified for the coveted placards last year, ranging from the state lottery to the US Navy recruiting office, which was allocated an astonishing 110 permits.”
In fact, so many agencies produce and distribute the parking placards that the city has no idea how many are out there! The mayor's office guesstimates 70,000, but Transportation Alternatives, who run a website that posts photos of illegally parked cars with permits, says 150,000 is more like it because of all the counterfeit and expired placards out there.
A study conducted by Transportation Alternatives last year found that three-fourths of the permits are used illegally, with drivers blocking “fire hydrants, bus stops, crosswalks”, and even parking on sidewalks! Speaking to the Post and the Sun, Wiley Norvell of Transportation Alternatives sounded victorious:
This is huge. The 20 percent figure is substantial. This is really taking a whack at bad government and the culture of entitlement that developed around these permits. Government workers commute at twice the rate of everyone else because they have free parking at the other end, in the form of one of these placards.
The new plan, intended to cut congestion and pollution as well as corruption, goes like this:
- Every city agency is to conduct an inventory of its permits and reduce them by 20%. This would eliminate roughly 14,000.
- They must stop issuing new ones as of March 1st. (Less than eight weeks to call in a favor to your buddy at the Navy recruiting office.)
- As of March 1st only the Police Department and the Department of Transportation will have the authority to issue the coveted parking placards.
- A multi-agency working group will implement and coordinate the various measures.
- The NYPD will create a new enforcement unit to ensure compliance and agencies will develop enforcement procedures to prevent the abuse of placards.
"if the city yanks our plaques, then the war is on. the pba can have some printed for its members, active and retired, and i will bang out every car with official plates that is illegally parked or runs a light (the offenders can explain themselves in front of an administrative judge at AAB or parking violations bureau)....JUST WAIT AND SEE."What do you think? Good news for congestion or an overly-zealous attack on the public trough to which our civil servants have grown so accustomed?
Photo of a Postal Service employee's vehicle parked on the sidewalk via Uncivil Servants.
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Unqualified good news.
fuck the police
Make it real simple: Revoke old "paper" permits, issue new cards/stickers (a la college campus parking permit stickers) with serial numbers on it, then put a cap on how many can be issued at any one time.
Yeah good news, but that still won't get a police officer to enforce the law and do his job.
A car with an NYC24 license plate is parked on the sidewalk off Hanson Pl (next to the NY State office building) two or three times a week. This has gone on for years.
A car with an NYC24 license plate is parked on the sidewalk off Hanson Pl (next to the NY State office building) two or three times a week. This has gone on for years.
If the police want to start ticketing public officials, fine by me. All the more reason to yank their placards if it encourages them to perform an aspect of their job they've personally chosen to look the other way on.
I love how the Cadillac pictured has a very offensive South Carolina "In God We Trust" license plate on it. (If you haven't seen one look here it is the one at the bottom of the page.) Not only is the driver doing the whole registration scam, they are parked on the sidewalk. Brilliant!
i think the police and other agencies should park wherever they need to WHEN THEY ARE ACTUALLY WORKING.
oh, and working means actually during the time they are getting paid by the hour.....
nobody is above the law.... (MOST of the time).
The police don't want to start ticketing public officials, and this will not if it encourage them to perform an aspect of their job they've personally chosen to look the other way on.
The police are the enemy.
The war is on? Against the people whose taxes pay your salary?
This will help for some gov't agencies, but when it comes to cops ticketing cops, they'll always figure out some system to identify each other so they won't ticket each other's cars. It might be some informal thing like leaving a Tootsie Roll wrapper on the dashboard, but they'll come up with something.
Wow, Bloomie taking on two of the greatest sources of arrogance in this city: the NYPD and automobile drivers!
I like Jibby's idea. They should also consider charging for all of the un-official parking spaces under bridges and overpasses that don't need plackards. There are always a flock of SUVs and cars parked just north of the Q'Boro bridge Manhattanside. I wonder what vital service those cars are performing for the city. Howcome they don't just take the subway to work and let the city rent those spots to upper east siders at fair market value.
commute via public transportation like the rest of us. WE will allow special circumstances but if you work 9 to 5 or 8 to 4 at a desk job then the LIRR, Metro North or NYCTA is what you'll take to work.
I live across the street from a fire station and around the corner from a police precinct--you can bet that there are ALWAYS cars parked on the sidewalk, cars double parked all up and down the block (thus forcing everyone else to drive in the bike lane). It's shitty. I'd be thrilled to have them lose some of those privileges--there are a dozen subway lines and the LIRR in walking distance. They can use public transit like the rest of us.