San Francisco Bans Parking Spot Auctioning App

A couple months ago, we discussed a new phone app being used in San Francisco to auction off parking spaces to the highest bidder. The city has now ordered the app makers to cease and desist, and threatened motorists with a $300 fine for each transaction. City Attorney Dennis Herrera said, Technology has given rise to many laudable innovations in how we live and work -- and Monkey Parking is not one of them. It's illegal, it puts drivers on the hook for $300 fines, and it creates a predatory private market for public parking spaces that San Franciscans will not tolerate. Worst of all, it encourages drivers to use their mobile devices unsafely — to engage in online bidding wars while driving. People are free to rent out their own private driveways and garage spaces should they choose to do so. But we will not abide businesses that hold hostage on-street public parking spots for their own private profit.

Comments

Gotta agree with it being illegal

[Anonymous Coward]

It's based on holding public space hostage.

Re:Gotta agree with it being illegal

[ultranova]

Having said that, I grant that it could be used in ways that are likely illegal... like holding the spot for the person who won the auction. Then you might be said to be actually holding it hostage. But that would mean you -- not the winner of the auction -- were breaking the law. And it would be hard to prove.

The only way information received from this application could possibly be useful was precisely if the auctioner held the spot for the winner. Because otherwise it would already be long taken by the time they got around, even if they were just a few city blocks away. Alternatively, San Francisco has an abundance of parking spaces, so what would be the point of this app?

Does it ever make you uncomfortabe how posting this kind of reflexive, unthinking, ideology-based bullshit makes you exactly like the Stalinists of old, just with a different set of keyword triggers? Do you ignore the similarities because clearly, their ideology was wrong and yours is right? Or do you simply lack the self-awareness to notice?

Re:They hate our freedom

[Firethorn]

But not the basic fact of people exchanging money for information.

It falls back to 'holding a public space hostage' the moment the seller stays in his spot any longer than he would have without the application in order to get said money/allow the buyer the spot. I believe that the application amounts to being worthless if the seller doesn't hold the space for the buyer, because in my experience somebody will pull into the spot less than a minute later without any intervention.

This leads to less efficient use of space due to lingering, which is what the city wants to avoid.

Enforceable ?

[markus_baertschi]

The company is based in Italy and does not target San Francisco specifically. I don't think San Francisco has standing to sue them.

Re:They hate our freedom

[whoever57]

These people are providing the city the great and valuable service of a functional smart parking grid operating when parking congestion is high.

There seems to be an unwritten premise behind your claim that the space would be unused if it were not for this app. In fact, the reverse is true -- likely the driver "selling" the space will remain in place longer than necesssary so that he/she can sell the parking space. Without the ability to sell a space, it will be vacated more quickly and then immediately filled by another driver who happens to be driving by (because there is a shortage of parking).

Re:They hate our freedom

[pr0fessor]

I pay taxes that are used to build and maintain roads including public parking, why on earth would I allow a third party to make money off public parking if it's not re-invested into the road system (hopefully to address problems with parking).