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How Open Government Data Saved New Yorkers Thousands On Parking Tickets
jfruh (300774) writes "Ben Wellington is a New Yorker and city planner with an interest in NYC Open Data, the city's online open government initiative. One thing he noticed in this vast dataset was that just two fire hydrants in the city generated tens of thousands of dollars a year in tickets. The sleuthing by which he figured out why is a great example of how open government data can help citizens in concrete ways."
No kidding - "Shut up before people realize we're SOAKING THEM!"
There was a fire hydrant on the sidewalk, with a bike lane between it and drawn parking spaces. In US cities you can only park where there is a parking space explicitly drawn, so this spot had exactly what you were looking for and people parked. And got ticketed. And this happened all the time, since it looked like a perfectly fine parking spot, but the NYPD disagreed. Apparently no-one had complained loud enough (I'd think such tickets would be very easily contested), but when this guy blogged about it after seeing the data and it went viral, the DOT fixed it relatively quickly by marking it as a no-parking space.
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
Having been in traffic court a few too many times, let me tell you: fighting tickets is NOT what the judge is looking for. For this type of small time high volume casework they HEAVILY steer you toward making a plea and not stating your case to save time. They are usually not willing to hear people out and more punitive if you claim not guilty vs going the no contest route (what they want). I'm talking mostly about speeders, I've never been to court for a parking ticket, but I believe it may be the same court.
Why is he left wondering why the DOT didn't analyze the parking ticket data? BECAUSE THEY DON'T HAVE TO. DOT and their associated fines act as the Executive, as opposed to the Legislative or Judicial Branches.
It's trendy to consider society as a single organism in which everyone works for an optimal outcome, but the approach is flawed. The DOT is not in the business of analyzing which parking areas generate the most money, if anything, they should be in the business of optimizing the parking areas which make the LEAST money.
+1 for geekiness and making the data accessible, but righteous indignation is really out of place and show a remarkable degree of insulation from the real world.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
I thought people take the subway or the taxi. I didn't see any parking lots or garages in New York City / Manhattan. I didn't see any cars parked along the curb. I must be missing something.
Glasses, I assume.
Here is my problem with contesting parking tickets. I once had a rental in Chicago (as I did not own a car at the time) that I had for a weekend. About a month later I got a parking ticket in the mail forwarded on from the car rental agency for parking in a no-parking zone. However, I never parked there, nor was in that part of the city. I am guessing the meter maid wrote down the wrong date or time on the citation as I was never there.
However, I was presented with two choices: 1) Pay 75 dollar fine 2) Take a day of vacation time to go to the city and contest it on a Thursday.
At the time, I made an after-tax rate of around 150 dollars per day. Even if I could do it in a half day, I am paying 75 dollars to possibly recoup 75 dollars. If I lost the argument, I paid 75 dollars to pay another 75 dollars. This is a real kobiyashi maru type situation for me, in which I just paid the ticket. It wasn't fair, it wasn't right, but it's the choice that makes the most sense.
I've also got a parking ticket that I didn't feel was just for being parked in front of a fire hydrant. That time it was me driving, however, I had pulled over to the side of the road to use my phone as I was getting an important call. While I was on the phone, (with four way blinkers on) a police officer came up and asked me to move, which I did. Before asking me to move, they took a picture of my car and sent in the ticket. This was completely legal (I was 'parked' in front of the hydrant), but completely unjust to me. Again, it wasn't worth my time to try to contest it. It was legal but unjust (in my mind)
"Hacker arrested for stealing $57,000 from NYPD"
"After breaking into government computers and accessing unauthorized data, in much the same way that Aaron Swartz and Andrew Auernheimer did before him, notorious terrorist Ben Wellington manipulated government records to steal over fifty thousand dollars directly from the people of New York City. In the interests of protecting freedom and democracy, SWAT teams arrived at the homes of Wellington, who hides behind the non-de-crime of "I (redacted) NY", along with members of his immediate family and his dog who was shot while trying to resist arrest.
"The criminal mastermind is being held without trial in a secure, undisclosed location and has been denied access to telecommunications equipment for fear that he might use a pay phone to break into the Pentagon and whistle the correct codes to launch nuclear missiles at Mayor Bloomberg."
"The Attorney General's office then went on to congratulate itself for protecting freedom everywhere, and urged everyone to enjoy their new twenty gramme chocolate ration."
...how the city most likely deliberately ignored the parking issue because they were bringing in so much money. There is no doubt that they knew what was happening and made a conscious decision to leave things as they were.
Government at all levels have become adversarial as those who are employed by it seek to protect their revenue stream at all costs.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
If the engine was on and you were in the vehicle, you weren't "parked," you were "standing." Most municipalities have different rules for "no parking" and "no standing" because if there was a real problem (e.g. the building caught fire and they needed the hydrant) you'd presumably notice and get the hell out of the way.
Actually for all crimes, regardless of severity, plea bargains are the order of the day. The legal system couldn't come close to handling even 10% of the cases if they were to go to court.
Are agnostics skeptical of unicorns too?
I've defended myself in such cases when I was in college and the local police were making a significant amount of their revenue through frivolous tickets. They brought in witnesses and everything in one case. Every time the city was extremely angry with me for taking it to court. The judge was ok with it however. The police officers were literally rolling their eyes in court. I asked one if she needed eye drops and the judge snickered.
The problem with parking tickets is they are usually based on Ordinances which, in the USA, are often passed by committee... sometimes even by the local law enforcement and can be changed on a whim. In one case, they'd required a permit for certain parking spots which I had, but a few days before I got my ticket they "revoked" permit parking in that area with no notification or indication. I lost that case with the judges sympathy. The fines are too small to get a real lawyer for, but taking them to court at least deprives local government of any profit. Also, it's fun to play Perry Mason and give a cops a hard time on the stand. Just be respectful and don't argue with the judge. If the judge appears not to like you and/or be a "hanging judge" just sit back and lose. You might make things worse by being talking too much. In my experience though, you wont run into much of that in traffic court. Familly court however? Those judges, understandably, have a bad day, ever day... Just nod and agree with them.
You have to fight more creatively than that. As others have noted, many authorities cynically use situations like this to "generate" revenue. They've set the system up to make it difficult to fight and change. Going through whatever process they set up is not likely to have any effect.
I tried their system on a red light camera ticket. Had my evidence that their yellow was too short and requested a hearing. The hearing was a total kangaroo trial. My evidence was ignored. It was picture number one showing that the light was red before the car crossed the painted line, and picture number two showing the red light and the car in the intersection. Verdict: guilty. End of discussion. That the light in picture number one would have been yellow if it had been set to the correct time was not considered. The judge advised me that I could go on to municipal court and raise that question there, where it would be considered. Well, maybe. But I was through with them. What would happen next if I went on? The muni court would rule against me and tell me I could appeal?
They've also cunningly set their shakedown price at a low enough level that it's not worth fighting. The ticket was "only" $75. I fought anyway, but lost of course. Also, to dodge around the requirement that the accused gets to confront the accuser, they made this an offense against a city ordinance, not a traffic violation. So you don't get screwed by your auto insurance company seizing on this as an excuse to consider you a more dangerous driver, and raising your rates. This dodges around another problem, which is that they have nothing to show who was actually driving the car. They simply fine the owner, never mind who was driving.
There's a flip side to this weaseling out of those legal requirements. The simplest way to fight is to refuse to pay. Their power to compel payment is much more limited. They can't put a black mark on your record and have the state stop you from renewing your driver's license or car license, because it's not a traffic violation.
So, what to do? I can't vote against the politicians who set this all up, as I don't live in that city. I can however boycott businesses in that city, and I do. It's not just pure revenge, it's also prudence. I don't risk any more tickets if I never drive there.
In a similar vein, I fight against the MAFIAA creatively. One can pirate, of course, and millions do. But what I did was dig into the backgrounds of the people they use in their battles to terrorize ordinary citizens. Specifically, their expert witnesses. In one case, the witness was affiliated with a university, and was using their name. I inquired of that university's provost whether they approved of this activity by their employee. Turned out, they didn't even know about it. And when they found out thanks to me telling them about it, they definitely didn't like it. Haven't heard a peep out of that expert witness since.
Intellectual Property is a monopolistic, selfish, and defective concept. It is "tyranny over the mind of man"
Last time I fought a ticket was in Lynnwood, WA. I won - it was a bogus ticket. The magistrate threw it right out within 10 seconds of the start of my case. Of course, the administrative fee for going to court was $125 - as much as the ticket itself. So what did I gain, except the loss of half a day?
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
how is that even remotely fair? if you get charged with something, you have to pay a fee to even argue the merits of that accusation?????
It's fair because they say it is fair.
In the City of Chicago, the court fee for arguing a parking ticket is MORE THAN THE TICKET. I learned that the hard way, when a "No Parking" sign was pointing at a hydrant, but apparently the "No Parking" zone extended another 100 feet to the next intersection. Pay $50, or go to court for $65? (These prices are from 10 years ago; I can't believe it's gotten better since then.)
A small town where I grew up was infamous in the area for always having a cop hiding in the immediate vicinity of a 25mph speed limit sign. They would ticket anybody and everybody that was going above the limit when they passed that sign. It was well known that the only reason they could have a police department at all was that speed trap, and it was their main source of revenue for the town. That went on for more than a decade until one day they ticketed the wrong person, he turned out to be a lawyer that knew state traffic laws pretty well. He recognized that they had illegally reduced the speed limit on a state route. the law being they couldn't lower it below 35 without an extenuating circumstance like the presence of a school. So he took them to court and forced them to repay over a decades worth of speeding ticket revenue. He managed to completely bankrupt the town government and no one has to fear a speed trap there anymore.
There is a city about an hour away from where I live now that has a reputation for speed trapping though they haven't done anything illegal that I can tell. They've just lowered the speed limit on a 15 mile stretch of interstate from 70 to 55, for no apparent reason other than to have a ready supply of speeders whenever they want. I have to drive through there periodically and I refuse to stop and conduct any business in their municipality. And I go out of my way to bring up the whole thing whenever someone mentions that town.