Taking lessons from Judy Hopps.

I once got a ticket years ago, where I was still in the car when the meter expired, and was ticketed since I was about to pull out. The city attorney told me I was ticketed by the most aggressive meter reader in the city. he averaged 350 tickets a day. But the attorney was kind enough to dismiss the ticket since I was in the process of leaving when I got the ticket.

Yup. Judy Hopps syndrome.

Where's "Cool Hand Luke" when you need him? It was just as bad in the Montclair Village of Oakland when I lived there. There were only two parking lots in the Village that didn't charge for parking in them, but only with for 90 minutes. On certain days there'd be tow trucks roaming the street, hoping to steal away with "Offender's" vehicles who would end up paying up to $4,000.00 to release their cars.

Oh, during special events here, its not uncommon to see cars being ticketed and towed within minutes and during rush hour, the city has tow trucks lined up to haul away cars parked in certain lanes at exactly 4 PM. I'm told those tickets are $40 (this was before the recent price hike) and a $240 towing fee and then impound fees.

And in the "Free Parking" area, they still will ticket you if you exceed one hour, they have camera cars that patrol those areas and alert the meter nazis to ticket them.

AND God help you during a snow Emergency day, ZERO Tolerance.

He must work for Antifa on his off time.

...because hes a traffic cop that gives a shit about his job and does it as he's told to do? I think you need to rethink your idea about who's with Antifa. Certainly not policemen, even if they're only ticketprinters.

Just when I think of fascist nazis, like ACTUAL nazis, I think Antifa. Funny how they are more fascist then anyone they claim to oppose.

Maybe, but Antifa certainly also opposes police, because they're "the fingers of the fascist government keeping you down" and because they protect peaceful right wing protestors abiding by the laws and rules of protesting, which again, in their mind, means the police protect the fascists.

This guy was doing his job. Maybe overzealously, but I'd rather have a cop give a shit about his job and do it by the book rather than not give two fucks and have no love for his duty.

Maybe he is a just a overly compensating 'super cop' who is more just a super strict meter maid, but on the other hand he might be under the gun of the city to fill quotas.

Where I live (In south Texas) we sometimes have issues with the cops getting quota demands. When that happens, they are real assholes about everything. Case in point; years ago I was talking with a friend of mine at a bar she used to work at. One of the guys leaving the bar runs back in to warn everyone that a squad car parked out front and another out back and, due to the fact that they were on a quota system at the time, were simply arresting everyone who left the bar for 'public intoxication'. It was a super dick-move, as at the time there was no requirements to arrest someone for Public Intox, all you needed was probable cause, which was under the interpretation of the officer making the arrest, not you. You did not need to be walking funny, they did not need to have video evidence or wait for someone to file a complaint, they did not even need to give you a breathalyzer or a sobriety test, they just needed to point and say 'Your drunk' and bam, your ass is going to jail. And you could not argue it right away, as it was after 5pm in a friday, so your ass was going to sit in jail until monday morning when the courts opened up again, no exception. In fact it was not uncommon for the cops to fuck with people they did not like by simply busting them for public intox for no fucking reason other then they could. Total Bullshit. I had to sit in that fucking bar for hours waiting for those narcs to fuck off somewhere else.

I agree thats a dickmove, and I find "public intox" laws kind of backwards anyway. But whatever, relic of the prohibition era and so on. Me bitching about that would be as stupid as an american gun owner raving about german gun control laws. Its useless and you know, different cultures with different histories behind them.

Anyway, the reason I rebuked your comment is because I see a lot of americans just liken everything to Antifa or Nazis, whether thats fitting or not, and that cheapens the term. Calling someone a nazi used to have a big meaning to it. Calling someone a fascist used to have a big meaning to it. Hell calling someone a communist used to do that. But they dont have that punch anymore, because everyone throws these words around like they're candy and its mardi gras. And worse when people use terms like fascism or Nazi (extreme right) to stigmatize far left groups like Antifa.

Yeah, the law can be inflexible at times. But it shows that they genuinely give a shit about their job, and are unlikely to accept bribes and whatnot.

I just read an article about that guy Trump fired, Sebastian Gorka.

Someone took a picture of his car parked on the sidewalk.

(He has a personalized plate.)

The SOB was never ticketed.

all men are equal. but some are more equal than others.

Yup, seems about right these days. :/

one time I got a parking ticket, car park was blocked in by a large semi so i couldn't move it...not even if I was with Opitmus Prime, but i over stayed, the guy said he normaly gives people up to 15 mins more grace on the off chance, and if the car is still there after he tickets, but I have seem some very over zealous ones like here, some do it spot on, others seconds over, but at times I have seen some do it because it is a necessity but most are like this.

Revenue raising.

Wichita is just as bad and why I will not take my truck down town at all let alone park there.

Made one of these guys angry with parking at a restaurant parking lot and then walking all the way to the place i needed to go.

Officer Hopps has competition. 40 seconds! Does the word "leeway" mean nothing?

One $hould gladly do their part for public $afely

City Mayor needs Hookers and Cocaine so suck it up!

I'd be watching for the meter reader's vehicle/cruiser/whatever and see where they're parking if so. If it turns out to be in the wrong place, get them towed.

No meters where I live. I don't remember the last time I used one. Everywhere I go has parking lots.

+1. I think I've fed a meter precisely once in the past 5 years.

Thats cause in Arkansas, they are still baffled by things like electricity and indoor plumbing.

Yeah, but the moonshine is second to none!

From the land of fire breathing water....Waaaaahhhhterrrr

The nearest city to me pulled out all of its traditional parking meters recently and replaced them with electronic ones that can take cards as well as coin.
So instead of simply putting a coin in the meter at the parking space you now have to wander around to find the correct meter unit (they can be up to 100m from the parking space) insert the money and type my cars registration number into the unit. They don't give any receipts either so if you don't have a phone with a calendar app you are sol.

It used to be that you would just feed money in and a printed slip would come out so you could put it in the dash of your car. However many hours were paid, that was it.

But, because kiwi's are nice folks, if you paid for a whole day, some people would leave paid up tickets on the machines for other people to use later. Of course the $@#^%! sob's at the parking agencies then decided to make so you've got to now input your rego number on the ticket so now only one ticket can be used with one car. Fucking greedy fuckers.

It's even worse this unit doesn't give you a ticket to display at all. Not even a receipt for paying with an EFTPOS card. Instead it gave me a number and a website URL to go to to download the receipt.
It just displays the time you have on the screen for 30 seconds. I had to enter it into my phone so that I wouldn't forget.

Ooof, that is rough.

It could be worse. There was an article in the newspaper earlier this week where some guy got clamped when he parked in front of a closed store to pick up some pizzas from the neighboring store. In the time it took him to walk into the store, get the pizzas and walk back out his car was clamped and the clamper demanded $350 to unclamp his wheel. Apparently he got of lightly as this guy is known to demand up to $750 at times.

In times like that, you carry a clamp of your own, then clamp their vehicle. Being that it's your private property that you've attached to their vehicle that in no way damages it, they cannot remove/damage it with out your consent. Every argument they bring to you about them clamping your vehicle, you turn right back around to your clamp on theirs. They'll spout all kinds of harassment, but eventually will have to remove their clamp so you will remove yours.

I used to contract out and run my own business, and once my vehicle was clamped so I then wrote down the name/number of the agency, told them that they were holding me up from a job and that I was now charging them to the tune of $500 per hour for my time, which I would then send to baycorp to collect. That clamp got removed quick smart.

I've also carried a valve stem removal tool, correctly and safely remove all their air from their tires, then return the valves. Again, you're not damaging their car in any way, just severely inconveniencing them. They can't touch you otherwise that's assault. After the 2nd tire they usually soften up pretty quickly.

The thing is, those companies that use clamps, are usually on the very shady side of the law, and generally speaking use intimidation and coercion to get you to pay exorbitant fees. You just have to be smarter/more shady to get around them.

When I was living in the SF Bay Area, I had to park at a local BART station so I could board a train to an event in Oakland. To get the parking permit (day use) I had to spend money entering the main gate at the station, just to get to the machine dispensing the parking permits. Then spend fair money going back OUT of the station with the permit to put it onto the dash of my car. Then "ADD-FAiR" to the same train ticket to be able to travel to my Oakland destination.

The permit would allow me to park in an area designated free until 8 am (It was after 10 am when I got the permit). I double checked the permit time stamp, and the signs right by the car.... everything was square!

Got back around 4 pm... I had this ticket on my windshield! Really, pissed me off, because I was parked legally! Thank GOD for cell phone cameras.

I had the permit (photo'd). I had the sign.. (Photo'd). Sent all that into the BART main office electronically, with a complaint and the needed explanation as to why I contested the ticket.

Two weeks or so passed and I get this letter in the mail. It say's (though they didn't really admit it in so many words) that they "F-d" up! But, they worded it as if THEY were doing me a favor by letting me off the hook!

It was frustrating to go through all that, to prove I was in the right.. then to be talked down to.

Yeah.. I totally get this comic, the irony and the frustration with such jerks who must loiter to give out those types of tickets. The jerk probably does it deliberately to make quota.

Something to watch out for: in some places the meter maids will write tickets in advance of the meter expiring. I've read about one case where a guy got a ticket while he still had time left on the meter, took the ticket to the local station, waited in line, and when he got to the cashier asked to see the manager. Manager comes over and asks what the issue is, and the guy looked at the clock, placed the ticket on the counter and pointed to the time on that ticket which was still 30 minutes away, saying "I think you have a time traveler on staff".

Ticket was thrown out, but it's still a dick thing to do IMHO.

Ouch, cities will do that to raise money...

nonono, it's for SAFETY! money does have nothing to do with it, y'hear? now gently pay your parkign ticket whydonchta. so your city has more money to sink it into useless projects and other black holes.

Yup.... badly scuplted statues reduce crime by scaring everyone away from downtime... and more freeway bypasses!

also, ill-sized roundabouts reduce traffic, while being repaired.

Stuttgart here as so badly shaped roads in many places it makes me wonder where all my tax money goes... probably into new parking taxameters.

Maybe your city council has been throwing bunga bunga parties instead of fixing the roads?

I do remember that our main mayor promised to have all relevant roads fixed by the beginning of the 2006 soccer champignonship. when plans came out for a brandnew arena (because the two existing ones were too puny or something, dunno.) where people would have to walk all tghe way around to reach the entry as though it was a shrine or somesuch. an uproar emerged upomn the utter waste of money. over this the street fixing was but forgotten... nowadays they are way worse than beforee, of course.

the true reason for it though, are contracts signed like, 30 years ago, now forcing them to put a püerfectly functional dead-end train station underground hoping to add synergy effects to the region (IMO a deadbeat argument when politicians want to erect prestigious buildings. or drill giant holes into the ground) because now trains are 10min faster in munich... the whole project is planned so tight it's no fun anymore. we can only hope it works as planned, because fixing it might prove to be impossible. (important detail: Stuttgart is situated at the bottom of a giant ancient volcano kettle with as big river running through. imagine drilling tunnels through that. they are already pumping off incredible amounts of ground water, and many places for the tunnels go through layers of anhydrite. some cities here have found out the hard way what forces dry gypsum with added water can unleash onto the fucktons of rock and buildings abvove... some houses are bound to collapse by now.)

could be way worse.

a few years ago, in the citys of Wuppertal, germany, someone decided to take his freshly restaurated and tuned-up VW 31303A to the light and get a license for it. drove it out of the sub-garage and parket it neatly before the house on a public parking space, and went downtown to get license plates and stuff. 2 hours or so later he returned to the car missing. tried to report it as stolen, but it turned out it was towed. hunted the car down, of course, because nobody could tell right away at which lot they parked it. but the designated space was empty. instead, they found the VW at a nearby car yard: doors, hoods, windows, fenders, engine/gear, even the interior were completely gone, even though the car had been towed just over 3 hours ago... all he had was an empty car shell. they even removed clips and the removable rear pan.
of course he went to court over it, and won like, 20k euros as a recompensation.
but authorities failed to state why:
1: the car was towed immediately; after german laws an unlicensed vehicle doesn't get towed until 3 weeks have passed, unless it's parked in the way of traffic or firefighting or other important placves - which it wasn't;
2: why it wasn't towed to the police' assigned storage lot and instead to a car yard;
3: who had ordered this to happen;
4: what team of workers picked the car apart to literal bare biones within a mere 2 hours;
5: and what the fuck happened to the parts, some of which were marked with the car's VIN to try and prevent theft...

You know... I don’t think he was really sincere when he said “Have a nice day!”
Call it a gut feeling. 🤔

Isn't there an option to pay by mail or online? It's been years sine I had to appear in person for anything other than a passport, driver license or jury evasion (nee selection). Or are you a cash-only kind of person?

I can pay on-line or via mail. I just rather pay with cash at that point. Plus I was downtown at the time. Cause I found out that renewing my plates on-line, actually cost me $4.00 more cause it was a fee for paying on-line, and funny thing is , you pay at DVM, its a $5.00 counter fee. So I just mail in that renewal. But they are jacking that up next year as well.

Something similar happened to me, some years ago. I got a moving violation ticket in Coral Springs (which I won't go into the details about), and I went to Fort Lauderdale to pay my fine. I'd placed enough money in the meter for one hour's worth of parking - not realizing that it took over fifty-five minutes just to get to the window to pay said fine. Sure enough, when I ran back to my car, the meter maid slapped a ticket on my windshield... one minute after the time on the meter expired!

Today, I don't have to worry about getting any more tickets... I no longer have a car (having gave it up, when I had a low-paying job, earning not enough money to afford auto insurance), and my driver's license expired five years ago! I now commute by bicycle and 'mass transit' (bus and train), and it's a helluva lot better than being in traffic with 'distracted drivers' ('texting' or talking on their cell phones)!

"Happy Thanksgiving!"