If you read the general internet it’s all mobbed up guys stealing cars from law-abiding single mothers for no reason at all but then again if I believed the general public about parking violation enforcement here in germany I’d come to the conclusion they’re the new jews.
So how bad is that whole privatized towing / enforcement thing, really? Is there an actual problem beyond “it’s a private company” or is it mostly carbrain tears?
Parking is a battle in the cities I’ve been in, I haven’t seen any data but I’ve heard anecdotally of the ruthless tow truck drivers, cruising around busier areas to snatch bad parkers. I drove a food truck for a time and there would always be cars in our designated spot so I didn’t mind lol.
They don’t really have the opportunity for it outside of a city, the tow truck driver I knew in a partly rural suburb was usually pulling cars out of ditches n such.
Bad parkers should be punished, though. Cars shouldn’t be in cities, anyway, but until we reach that level of planning we need to remove these stupid things from bike lanes, bus stops, loading zones, etc. As long as there is clear signage there’s no reason not to tow them.
They shouldn’t be “punished” what the fuck? They shouldn’t have their lives upended and massive fines and loss of transport over such a minor thing. If the car is in the way or dangerous, it should be moved to a close nearby place and released for free by the city - not arbitrarily fucking held ransom hours away so some small business tyrant can make a buck. Pretty obscene of you to downplay this and call for punitive actions against working people who have to drive to their jobs
If parking in the bike lane means the city sends somebody out with heavy equipment to find a legal spot for you, of course drivers will abuse that. You’d find that abhorrent if it were a service sold to rich assholes, so how is it at all appropriate to open it up to everyone and leave bike lanes permanently clogged with people taking advantage of free asshole parking?
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Your everywhere-is-free-parking service is incompatible with crosswalks and bike lanes and sidewalks. You’ve outflanked Musk on carbrain and call others reactionary.
you are just a “but but the welfare queens will steal all the groceries with their food stamps and sell them for crack” crank who hates poor people who serve you. If you find your views aligning with Musk and communists mocking you for being a reactionary, maybe have some introspection of your heinous ass opinion
This isn’t a fabricated concern. Our bike lanes are regularly blocked by cars. If you lower the price of blocking the bike lane to $0, people will do that more. The poorest people, by the way, don’t have cars and are also inconvenienced by cars on the crosswalk, bike lane and sidewalk. But fuck them, right?
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Let’s say someone is having a crisis and is on the subway tracks. Do we just stop everything and wait for them to leave? In a healthy society they would be helped off the tracks and attended by social workers. Now, you’re saying that someone blocking a bike lane should be afforded special treatment despite being a selfish asshole? How do you propose society works around sociopaths and narcissists? Just accomodating them at every turn? Oh, wait, that’s just what we have right now.
Notice how you go from “help them off the tracks” (compassion, fixing the problem, no punishment) to “afforded special treatment despite being a selfish asshole” where “special treatment” is just not having their car stolen. This is punitive. You are being inconsistent. We should “help the car off the tracks” not punish people. Your anti-car idealism has expanded to the point you’re wanting to punish poor people who drive
The difference is that blocking a bike lane is a choice that someone made and having a crisis is not. Why are you foaming at the mouth to defend awful people? How much is GM paying you? I would put forward that the people most likely to have a laissez faire attitude to parking violations probably see fines and towing as minor inconveniences. I know that I, as a poor person, would never put myself in that situation because the cost of recovering a car would fuck me over for a very long time. Parking in the bike lane, in a handicap spot, on the sidewalk, etc is not a form of protest. It doesn’t need to be protected or accommodated.
This is not even idealism. I just want other forms of locomotion to have equal standing. Instead, we have car supremacy and everyone must let the carbrains do as they please or they’ll get big mad and start killing people. Note that I’m not defending towing companies, just the removal of cars that people have deliberately parked in order to obstruct other forms of transit. I’m not saying, “Actually, $400 per day at the impound lot is great.” I’m saying that if you always bend over backwards for drivers, they will continue fucking over everyone else. Drivers literally get away with murder and now they can’t even be made to make space for people outside of metal boxes on wheels? How long are pedestrians, cyclists, and transit riders meant to suffer? You seem to have all the knowledge. Enlighten us.
I wouldn’t say free, maybe give them an income-appropriate ticket at least. As long as the car isn’t held hostage.
Yeah parking enforcement is the one area I think fines are pretty reasonable, as long as they’re income adjusted. Like yeah, we do need to be able to discourage people from parking where they shouldn’t, but that doesn’t mean we should hold their cars hostage and ruin their lives.