The Parking Meter Turns 75 Today

nj_peeps writes "75 years ago Carl Magee filed a patent application for what would become one of the most hated inventions in history: the parking meter. From the article: 'Magee's brainwave was to install a device that had a coin acceptor and a dial to engage a timing mechanism. A visible pointer and flag indicated the expiration of the paid period, meaning you either had to move, put in more money, or face the wrath of the local constabulary. The design continued largely unchanged for more than 40 years.'"

Comments

So..

[Jorl17]

The Parking Meter: Haunting humankind for 75 years.

Hated, but necessary

[Anonymous Coward]

You really think it would make it easier to park in large cities for short errands if they didn't exist? Thank God someone actually thought enough to address the problem.

Re:Hated, but necessary

[Mashiki]

Where I live(that mystical place called Canada), they figured out that it cost businesses more money if there were meters then 2hr free parking, along with 15min errand spots. When we switched from meters to non, business downtown went up by 40%, and so did the available tax revenue.

Re:Hated, but necessary

[Smauler]

I live in a small town in the UK, and I sincerely believe that parking costs are the biggest factor in driving people from the town businesses to out of town supermarkets. I really believe upping business rates a little, and making parking free except for a few key places would spur growth in the town no end. For those who don't know English towns, space is _always_ at a premium, and generally there is little to no roadside parking - what parking there is is generally a council owned extortionate multi-storey relatively (hopefully) close to town centre.

Re:Hated, but necessary

[tlhIngan]

Where I live(that mystical place called Canada), they figured out that it cost businesses more money if there were meters then 2hr free parking, along with 15min errand spots. When we switched from meters to non, business downtown went up by 40%, and so did the available tax revenue.

Vancouver City Council is actually deciding to extend the parking meter hours to include Sunday as well. Turns out that the meters get moderated traffic, but on Sunday, it becomes a royal PITA to find a parking spot, short of paying at a parking garage.

Good and bad, it seems. Parking meters help encourage short term high-turnover parking, which businesses do like. The flip side is, well, potential loss of customers for those adverse to paying. Free parking, and you get stores angry that some employee working upstairs parked right in front of their store during most of the day, rotating every couple of hours or so.

It's a tough call for a city planner.

Anyone got any coins? Please?

[OFnow]

They won't accept pennies. 99% accept only coins. San Francisco is talking about 7 day a week
parking meter enforcement, Many at $3 per hour (or more?). And in San Francisco the
collection/enforcement departments spend more money than the meters take in! Net loss.

Cool Hand Luke . . .

[PolygamousRanchKid]

Captain: "Maliciously destroying municipal property while under the influence. What was that?"

Luke: "Cutting the heads off of parking meters, Captain."

Not a fan, but....

[Itninja]

In a bigger city near my home there are no parking meters. Instead, each parking spot int he business district is a '30 minutes only' (or sometimes only 15 minutes) between 7AM and 6PM. At least with meters you can pay more money and get to stay longer. In these spots all you can do is leave before Officer Cool (seriously that's his name) writes you a ticket.

Re:Not a fan, but....

[Chris Mattern]

Meter feeding is supposed to be against the rules just about everywhere there's parking meters, but enforcement can very considerably. The really strict places don't count on catching you feeding more coins in--they'll chalk mark your tires to track how long you've been there, and ticket you if you're over the max time even if you have time on the meter.

Re:Not a fan, but....

[Anonymous Coward]

I treat chalk marks on my tires like any other form of graffiti. If you don't remove it immediately, the taggers assume you don't care, and then there's no end to it.

Re:Yes, they piss me off

[jack2000]

Write to your congressmen. Make them scrap those abominations!

Why is this in YRO?

[AdmiralXyz]

Is parking for free an inalienable right now? Did I miss a recent update to the US/EU constitutions?

Re:Why is this in YRO?

[mcsqueak]

Parking shouldn't be free, we already subsidize driving enough as it is without allowing people the unlimited ability to park their private property on public land, as long as they would like. Make them pay for the privilege, it's part of the "privilege" (not right) of driving.

I also enjoy the turnover parking meters create, ensuring that most of the time when I need to run an errand downtown and have to drive, I can find a spot with minimal trouble.

End of an era...

[sponga]

Parking Meter is dying...
Cheaper operations and ones that produce more written tickets for violators are more productive.
Being replaced by 'buy a ticket for half-day or full day' or more modern digital ones that detect when a car moves from the spot so the next person doesn't get free time.

Let us not forget the 'Parking Meter Fairy' http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKTFCdpBsAA
Although only to find out it is illegal to put coins in other peoples time slots, those things are nothing but a source for parking tickets and as we call the Ticket writers around here 'Vultures'.

Oklahoma City site of first parking meter
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZQgPRFgkOA

How to Hack a Parking Meter
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2CZ6yHJdBs

How to hack electronic parking gates
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1BA37BmMgBc

How to Rip-off a Parking meter
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOz7cdNaQ3c

Hi Tech Parking Meter, Los Angeles
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y76VFJ0LoOU

Re:End of an era...

[Smauler]

We've got reserved spaces for parents with children at all our supermarkets in the UK now - Personally, I think that if your kid can't walk the extra 50 yards to get into the sugar laden crammed supermarkets you've got bigger fucking problems than not being able to park right next to the door.

No, I'm not bitter...

Exact URL/link to the story.

[antdude]

http://www.wired.com/thisdayintech/2010/05/0513parking-meter-patent/ since http://www.wired.com/thisdayintech/ is just an index and will change soon.

To keep spaces open for customers

[tepples]

So, taxes pay for the roads, the sidewalks, etc. If you pay taxes, and you park where these fucking abominations are, then you get the pleasure of paying another tax

Do you use the same complaint against toll roads?

I'm assuming there was no vote when these things were put into play?

Imagine that you run a coffee shop. You want your customers to use the space in front of the shop while in the shop, and you don't want someone who works across the street to hog the space for 8 hours straight. So to keep the spaces open for customers, you restrict parking time to how long it takes to buy and consume coffee and a sandwich.

Re:To keep spaces open for customers

[jeffmeden]

Imagine that individual businesses had the power to set meter pricing and time limits... You would be on another planet, somewhere in a different solar system. The meters are there at the whim of the city. Properly used, they can be great tools. Misused or overused, and they can be a headache and a deterrent to regular customers.

Re:To keep spaces open for customers

[Mr. Freeman]

"Imagine that you run a coffee shop. You want your customers to use the space in front of the shop while in the shop, and you don't want someone who works across the street to hog the space for 8 hours straight. So to keep the spaces open for customers, you restrict parking time to how long it takes to buy and consume coffee and a sandwich."

That'd be great except that you, as the coffee shop owner, do NOT own that road. That road belongs to the taxpayers. You have no right to restrict who parks on the PUBLIC street. It would be a different story if YOU owned the road. Of course, that would mean that YOU have to pay to build the road in the first place. If you're willing to pay for it, then be my guest, you have every right to charge for use of the road.

What the real issue here is that the coffee shop owner wants to take PRIVATE control of PUBLIC property. I might as well try and claim ownership of the police station down the street and charge everyone who works there for use of the building.

Ah...city revenue in a box...

[aicrules]

I really didn't care about them too much till they installed them in front of my house. Granted I lived downtown at the time, but it was a house, not an apartment. Thankfully there was a street within walking distance that had no meters at least till I moved away. There was this old guy in the neighborhood that would always walk the roads nearby with a bag of change after they installed them and refill people's meters. He used to just walk around and talk to the people who would be sitting on their front porch, but apparently he had enough disposable income to keep about 50 parking meters fresh all day.

And as nice and selfless as that was, that hurt the city income enough that they made a local ordinance against filling other people's meters. They even tried to ticket him more than once. Then they started chalk marking tires to see if they went past a certain time and ticketed them anyway. Just another reason I grew up to be the anti-tax, anti-government program person I am today.

Re:Yes, they piss me off

[RIAAShill]

So, taxes pay for the roads, the sidewalks, etc. If you pay taxes, and you park where these fucking abominations are, then you get the pleasure of paying another tax on top of what you've already paid to park there.

That sounds great, doesn't it?

Sounds better than driving around for an hour trying to find a parking spot. Putting a price tag on a spot encourages use of public transit or private parking. It can also discourage even visiting in the first place, so municipialities and businesses have to consider whether demand is strong enough to support parking meters (or, in many cases, whether more investment in free parking is justified).

$2 an hour for a good shot at a nice parking spot, along with the knowledge that I'm giving a boost to help fund improvements in the roads, schools, and other assets and services, doesn't seem like such a bad deal to me.

There's something worse

[roc97007]

Downtown Portland Oregon got rid of their curbside parking meters. Used to be, you got out of your car and put in a quarter or a dime (or a nickel if you're an old fogey), twisted the little thingy and went on your way.

Now you get out of your car, lock the doors (this is Portland...), walk a half block to the ticket vendor machine, and go through the five discrete steps necessary to print a ticket. Assuming you're successful, you walk back to your car, unlock the door (this is Portland...) affix the ticket to your window with the sticky back, lock the door, and go on your way.

During rush hour, you may wait in line for a significant amount of time to get your ticket. Especially if the moron in front of you can not read directions, but I digress. Parenthetically, what happens if the meter maid happens by while you're in line for your ticket? I haven't had this experience yet.

When you get back to your car, peel off the ticket and throw it on the ground. Just kidding, you're supposed to hunt for a trash can, or throw it on the floor of your car along with the empty coffee cups and breakfast burrito wrappers, but looking at the gutters downtown it appears that a lot of people just drop them on the ground.

So we've replaced the purely mechanical, non-waste-producing (but generally hated) parking meter with an electronic, waste-producing, geographically distant, ticket vending machine that's even more hated.

Time marches on.

Re:There's something worse

[pclminion]

What's with the "this is Portland" thing? Portland has car prowlers like any city, but nothing particularly out of the ordinary. And anyway, why lock your door? Do you WANT a broken window? What are you keeping in there, suitcases of $100's?

Re:There's something worse

[DNS-and-BIND]

Maybe the idea is that you're not supposed to own a car, and that the private automobile is a wasteful, selfish mode of transportation? Ever think of that? Maybe the idea is to make every facet of car ownership irritating and oppressive, so that you'll have your car recycled and ride a bicycle instead? Ever think about how good it would feel to stop contributing to climate change and instead use a sustainable method of transportation?

Re:I am fine with the meters themselves

[Comboman]

Why hate the meters?

I agree. Now the guy who invented the pay toilet, that's another story.

Paging Luke Jackson

[Kozar_The_Malignant]

Get out your pipe cutter and celebrate.

Re:Yes, they piss me off

[JesseL]

The money collected from the meters may not amount to much, but the revenue from parking tickets for lapsed meters is spectacular.

I don't mind parking meteres.

[Petersko]

I live and work in a busy downtown area. If there were no meters all spots would be taken by 8:00 a.m. and anybody coming downtown during the day to do business would be out of luck.

Parking meters don't just take in money, they help moderate the usage of the space.

I'll miss them when they're gone

[PvtVoid]

...nothing better to lock your bike to.