Tag: parking

Power to the People: Let Residents Ticket

DC has an enforcement problem. Illegal construction. Residency for DC Schools. Traffic. Parking. Just having a law on the books does not solve the problem. Also there are activities that local MPD won’t deal with unless they observe the illegal action with their own eyes. So calling 911 a dozen times won’t result in diddly or squat. It is very frustrating.

Part of the problem is the city has decided that only the city can enforce its laws. Well that would be great if it did.

Van illeagally parkedI have a suggestion. Empower DC residents to ticket. Have DC residents provide the kind of evidence that would be admissible in court, via an app specifically for parking violations that would guide the citizen in what kind of images are needed to prove the parking violation. There are hundreds of cyclists who would love to ticket the various cars and delivery trucks that take up bike lanes. There may be several dozen people who would to ticket… and tow (if they could) the cars that park in their individually assigned handicap parking spots, as well those blocking curb cuts.

Maybe when the city actually enforces the law, with its own people, a contractor charging millions, or Lord forbid its own citizens, maybe people will actually respect and follow the law.

Did you park on P Street & get a ticket?

Blue, Red, Cream housesI’m just going to pass along ANC Bradley Thomas’ email, just in case you’re not on his list.

From: Thomas, Bradley Ashton (SMD 5E05)
Sent: Friday, September 1, 2017 11:10:24 AM
To: Thomas, Bradley Ashton (SMD 5E05)
Subject: Ticketed for Parking on the South Side of P Street near to Friendship-Armstrong School?

Good Morning All:

It has come to my attention that many cars have recently been ticketed for parking on the south side of the 100 block of P Street, NW.  I’m told that as many as ten cars were ticketed on Thursday morning for violating the new “No Parking School Days” restriction in the block.

Last Tuesday, I had a conference call with the District Department of Transportation (DDOT), which is the agency that installed the new no-parking signs on Sunday, August 13th.  On the call were administrators from Friendship-Armstrong Public Charter School and a representative from the Mayor’s office.  It came out in that discussion that the No Parking signs should not have been put in place as no one, not the school, not the Mayor’s office, not me speaking on behalf of the community, asked for them and that there was in fact no legitimate reason for them to be erected.  DDOT then agreed to remove the signs based on letters from the school administrators and me.  That removal should take place within two weeks or less.

Since the signs were unnecessarily placed and, as I indicated on the conference call, place an unreasonable burden on residents, I believe we have good cause to have any tickets issued for this violation vacated.  If you received such a ticket, please scan the ticket and e-mail it to me.  I can’t promise anything but I will put all of the tickets together and petition the Board of Traffic Adjudication or Mayor Bowser to waive or vacate them.  

If you don’t have the capacity to scan, you can make a copy of the ticket and get that to me.  Let me know if you need to do it that way and we can connect.  Also, I only have e-mail addresses for about 10 percent of the residents in our SMD so if you have neighbors who received tickets for this alleged violation and who might not receive this e-mail message, please have them get their tickets to me too. 

Thanks, and remember, we are having a short (one hour) Single Member District meeting next Saturday, 9:30 am, at Dunbar, so please come if you can.

Bradley A. Thomas
Commissioner-ANC5E05

Special Parking

I got my temporary parking pass in the mail about a week or so ago for Ward 5 and handed it over to my roommate who is only going to be with me for less than a month. After he leaves I’m jacking up the rent. Anyway, when I got that parking pass I felt special. But not as special as a certain neighbor who got their own parking space on the street.

Now first let me say this is not a criticism, just an observation and I was a bit bemused at this neighbor’s chutzpah.

There is some history. This neighbor likes to park the car in front of the house they live in. Most people do or try and several years back you could get away with parking in the same space day after day and sort of thinking of it as yours. Like church pews, seats at restaurants or in classrooms, there is this claim of ownership on something you cannot own. But due to always sitting in the same spot over and over, time after time one starts to think of it as theirs. Anyway, there was a battle over the space between neighbor #1 and neighbor #2. Neighbor #2 would park his big SUV thing in neighbor #1’s spot. Both are old timers, living here since the crack dealers roamed the land in huge herds and so this passive aggressive fight over the space has been going on for a while. Last week or so, neighbor #1 got a street parking spot for handicap parking for one specifically tagged car. Basically, their own guaranteed parking spot. The handicap? My best guess is age plus walking difficulty due to weight.

It may be more than that because we really don’t want people packing on the pounds just so they too can get their own special reserved street parking.

Parking Gets Ugly

Well I just called 911 to tell them not to bother as the fight broke up.
I was just about to shut down for the night when I heard yelling. Yelling beyond the usual drunken guy walking down the street or crazed teen yelling. Looked out the window and saw loudmouth buppie lawyer in his usual loudmouth form yelling at someone. It took me a while to figure out what the heck he was screaming about. A parking space. Another neighbor, let’s call her ‘skinny Jewish gal’ or “SJG’ (she has a name but so does Loudmouth Buppie Lawyer) in the car behind his SUV, being yelled at. This goes on a bit too long when another neighbor comes out and tells him to cool it. Then Loudmouth Buppie Lawyer dude turned his verbal abuse to the neighbor dude who I can’t think of a good name for, and then they are in the middle of the street yelling at each other. Sometime in this I call the cops. Neighbor dude’s wife come out and says something, then more neighbors appear in their doorways. Next thing I see neighbor dude and loudmouth buppie lawyer are yelling and are chest to chest.
All over a friggin parking space.

More on the Bundy Parking thing

Well good news, it appears that the Safe Shores folks won’t need the whole lot, read from the Friends of Bundy:

Dear Friends and Neighbors:

The District Department of Real Estate Services (formerly the Office of Property Management) has reviewed the parking requirements for the District’s Child Advocacy Center coordinated by Safe Shores at the Bundy School.*

With approximately 17 spaces available on the school lot, the site will require an additional 42 spaces in the back lot. This should leave approximately 8,800 square feet of space available for other use. [emphasis added]

As a reminder, the back lot is owned by the Federal government. The District cannot proceed with any plans (parking or otherwise) until after the land transfer is complete and funding is identified.

*The Safe Shores project is part of the District’s continuing effort to become a model jurisdiction by expanding the service capacity for children who are victims of physical and sexual abuse. Construction will be complete in November 2009. Subsequently, staff from the US Attorney’s Office, Office of the Attorney General, Metropolitan Police Department, Child and Family Services and the non-profit Safe Shores will move in and begin operations.

Robin-Eve Jasper, Director
DC Department of Real Estate Services
2000 14th Street, NW, Suite 800, Washington, DC 20009

And…

Dear Friends,

This August 7, 2009 announcement from the DC Department of Real Estate Services (DRES), formerly the Office of Property Management (OPM), suggests that there will be ample space left on the vacant lot at Bundy for use as a dog park (see url above).

According to DC’s Dog Park Regulations (Section 733.1 under Dog Parks: Site Guidelines and Specification), “a dog park shall be no less than five thousand square feet (5,000 sq ft) in area where feasible.” Hence, the remaining space on the vacant lot at Bundy — not used by parking for future Bundy School tenants — would still meet the minimum requirements for establishing a dog park.

We will continue our efforts to reach out to neighbors and dog owners in Wards 2, 5 and 6 so that we will be able to demonstrate the impressive support we have for a dog park when DPR begins to process our formal application.

Thank you for your support. Hope to see you on Aug. 21 for Jazz on the Green at Bundy Park with the DC Choro Ensemble.

Payam Bakhaje

Friends of Bundy Park