Parking Fire Hydrants

briggs

Does anyone think it would be nice it the curbs were painted (or something else was visible) to show exactly where parking can begin on either side of a fire hydrant? Not an obnoxious color...even just white would do. People never know where to park, so most of the time they overestimate the space to avoid getting a ticket (understandably) but many times it screws up parking for the rest of a block. Conversely, some people underestimate the space and end up getting a ticket (there is a car right outside of my house with a ticket now, and honestly it looks like he parked far enough from the hydrant. I would've parked there myself...)

Regardless of how people feel about owning/driving cars, the fact is that street parking is tight, and it would be nice if we had some guidance to make the most of the space that is available.

booklaw

Yes, but if we had more guidance, fewer people would be ticketed, and the city's revenues would decline. You don't really think the city is interested in making life easier or more pleasant for its residents, do you?

And for its car owners (upon whom the city wishes 10 plagues, like in ancient Egypt)...

homeowner

They used to be painted yellow (the curb), then people would complain they got tickets even though they were parked outside the yellow. The city stopped painting them (probably to save money) about ten years ago.

shekb

They paint the curb red in LA. Honestly it makes total sense to paint the curbs...you can't assume every driver is going to have a tape measure. At this point I don't even know what the law is without looking it up. I thought it was five feet from the hydrant, but recently I've heard 15. I know people regularly park within fifteen feet (really within zero feet) of the hydrant across the street from my building, and I can't remember seeing a ticket on any vehicle parked suchwise.

In a perfect world it ought to come down to a logical expression, such as "if a car is parked within a clearly delineated distance from a hydrant, established to be detrimental to the operation of a fire emergency vehicle, then ticket". What we seem to have, however, is, "nobody knows how far away you can park from this thing, and sometimes they'll nail you and sometimes they won't for totally arbitrary reasons."

Now, if they painted the curb in days gone by and people were still getting illegitimately nailed, all bets are off. People do like to cry "revenue stream" over matters like this, but I wonder what the cost-effectiveness is, given that a percentage is always going to fight an unfair ticket in court.

idlewild

I read somewhere, about a month or two ago, that a city councilman is not only looking to mark the fire hydrant boundaries, but make the distance 10ft instead of the present day 15.