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Most Bostonians to again get 48 hours of space saving after big snow storms, should we ever get any again
By adamg on Wed, 11/29/2023 - 1:06pm
Roslindale space saver back when we got snow.
Mayor Wu today announced the city will continue its 48-hour post-storm grace period for saving parking spaces for the coming winter, except in the South End and Bay Village, where space saving is never allowed.
In the customary pre-winter press conference in front of a giant city salt pile on Frontage Road by the Expressway, the mayor also said Boston has awarded three-year contracts to two minority-owned businesses - A & M Home Services and Mass Trucking, both of Roxbury - to continue a pilot for plowing out city-owned stairways and sidewalks in certain areas. Should Boston actually get snow, the city will also deploy equipment to plow both roads and bike lanes.
Under city rules, the 48-hour space-saver period starts at the official end of a snow emergency, again, except in the South End and Bay Village, where people just shouldn't be using space savers at all.
Residents and businesses everywhere are also expected to shovel out their sidewalks and curb ramps within three hours after the end of storms - or three hours after sunrise, should a storm end overnight.
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Comments
Amazing how lacking in
Amazing how lacking in political courage Mayor Wu continues to be. A lot of big rhetoric with very little follow through on the ground. The space saver rule is ridiculous and should be tossed.
Leadership would not
Leadership would not necessarily be outlawing all space savers, but if allowing space savers, then organizing a less chaotic system rather than this free for all where people key cars and smear dog poop. The city could easily whip together an online registration system. You shovel out a spot and then upload a picture along with the address.
Blame Mumbles
It's virtually impossible to rescind a privilege once granted, and this one was granted by Mumbles Menino, o profile in courage.
It’s funny to make fun of a speech impediment
Hahaha.
You’re a real class act.
Not really?
As far as I am aware, he was known as "Mumbles" because of his constant malapropisms. That isn't a speech impediment.
Everybody has to pick their battles
While I agree that the rule is ridiculous, I don't really want that to be the great political fight of our time. I'm sure the Mayor would rather spend political capital on something more consequential and transformative, and I'm fine with that.
Snow Happens
All we need is a good solid arctic vortex to leak from the weakly guarded arctic plus a mangled jet stream and some sauna water coming up the Gulf Stream and its 2015 all over again.
Seems like snow and cold are still a feature of winter around here, but more as terroristic events of record-breaking magnitude rather than predictable and consistent phenomena. 25" of snow in 24 hours? -12 overnight once?
What is the city's official position on enforcement?
Nasty notes? Keying the side of the car? Smashed windows? Stabbing? People need to know how to deal with those sociopathic menaces who think they can just park a car somewhere where there's not already a car sitting there
Sociopathic menaces
Think they own public property.
So, what's a few nasty
So, what's a few nasty consequences on the road to world class.
Space savers the official
Space savers the official mascot of Boston.
Now the entire city can bask
Now the entire city can bask in the glow of an old Southie tradition.
You dig it out...
you own it. That's my understanding of the unwritten law of parking spaces in winter.
That said, after the snow has melted, you have no more right to the space you dug out any more than you do in the other three seasons.
Back in the winter of '03 -'04 IIRC, people were so frazzled by needing to dig out their car every two days that there was a picture on the front page of the now-defunct Boston Tab of somebody's space saver. Simply a 5-gallon bucket with a sign sticking out of it that read
"If you park here, you will get flat tires!"
That same winter season, I saw a car in a parking lot - meaning it happened elsewhere - that had scrawled into the trunk of the car with a nail "DON'T PARK HERE"
That's how bad that winter was 20 years ago.
I respect the unwritten law. Now I have a home with a garage. You want the space in front of my house? You're welcome to it. YOU have to remove the snow from the curb though.
No
You dig it out, you get to park you car there until you move it. That's the only sensible, civilized rule in a city with not enough street space for everyone to park. Somehow, it mostly works in my crowded neighborhood in Cambridge even during the blizzard years, and if it works in the South End, it can work in Southie or Eastie or JP too.
I guess Wu is ok with keying cars and other vigilante enforcement if someone moves a space saver?
I respectfully disagree
You bust your hump shoveling a space out all morning, needing to get up earlier to do all that and go on your way to work. Someone else is enjoying the space that YOU broke your hump shoveling out? And then where do you park? I suppose you can find someone else's spot that they shoveled out, like you did, busting his hump to clear a spot in front of his house.
Is that fair to that other person?
And, as I said, once the snow melts, game over. It's not your designated spot any longer.
Come on
Come on. You act like it's a week at the beach. For that matter, you're pretending that it takes "all morning" to do a 15 minute job. I spent a decade shoveling out my street-parked car in Boston, so please, give the hyperbole a rest.
Is it fair that there are fewer parking spaces than vehicles that people want to park there? Is it fair if someone's at work when it snows and not a stay-at-home like you who has "all day" to shovel?
Come on. Be a grownup. Sheesh.
Hyperbole criticism accepted
I thought about that after I posted, but unlike YouTube, we can't edit our comments here.
No, it doesn't take "all morning", but it certainly takes more than 15 minutes, especially after the snowplow came through and put that mess all against the side of your car.
The spot is likely in front of your own house, and you shoveled it out.
You're making it sound like a minor inconvenience. When you return from work, it surely would be nice to park in front of your own house again, especially after you dug it out.
And as I clearly stated, once the snow has melted, no special treatment.
I also said that I respect someone else's shoveled-out spot.
If you, lbb, busted your hump shoveling your car out down the street from my house, and I needed to park, I would respect that you earned the right to your spot. If somebody else takes your spot, it wasn't me. When you come back to your own home after shoveling it out that morning and someone else is there, are you completely ok with that? If so, I commend you.
Works for me
On my private property.
If you want free parking on public property, well, go fish. You don't own the public street.
neighborhood boundaries
Can anyone link to somewhere with a map with the neighborhood boundaries that the city will use for enforcement? Always been a bit unclear to me where the line is between Roxbury and the South End. Is it Cass or Mass? Or something else?
I would venture to say
If the resident parking signs say "South End" or "Bay Village" then no space savers.
Technically I think the South End ends at Northampton St.
An overnight parking ban solves this problem
(I'll see myself out)
We have that in Arlington.
No space saver wars here :-)
(but the rest of the year, it's a pain ... )
Back from a long vacation?
Back from a long vacation?
Unfortunately...
Unfortunately, no, you never went away.
Mayor Wu, how about you just enforce the law?
https://codelibrary.amlegal.com/codes/boston/latest/boston_ma/0-0-0-16452
Seriously
I expected better from Mayor Wu. Space savers are about as dumb of a tradition as I can think.
Hoarding is sociopathic
In times of scarcity, hoarding is sociopathic.
There aren't enough parking spaces to go around. If you put a chair in an empty space while your car is somewhere else, then you're hoarding. Parking spaces on public streets are a shared resource, not private property.
Yeah but...
While I agree fully that nobody has any more right to the spot in front of their own home than anybody else, I abide by the "you shoveled it, you own it" until the snow melts.
Once the snow is gone, back to parking wherever you can.
If you, Bob, busted your hump shoveling your space in the morning and somebody else is parked all comfy cozy in that space, and you have to drive all over, looking for another space - possibly even needing to dig out a new space just to park halfway down the street from our own home - are you ok with that?