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Bikers served $40 notice to clear out of Pearl Alley
Friday, May 30, 2008
BY BOBBY PIERCE
Motorcyclists and scooter riders say the tickets they found on their bikes Wednesday afternoon mean they’ve lost their parking haven Downtown. But Columbus officials say they’re trying to find ways to accommodate the smaller vehicles.
The city is considering scooter and motorcycle parking in Pearl Alley, on Gay Street and near Columbus City Center, said Mike Brown, a spokesman for Mayor Michael B. Coleman.
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Bikers served $40 notice to clear out of Pearl Alley
By: Walker
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yesterday afternoon my lovely wife and I went to Mac’s for 1/2 price meat pies and a scotch egg followed by a trip to Jeni’s across the street. I was parked in one of the metered parking spaces in the lot next to the building, totally legal (for a change).
Upon return to my Steel Sled-dog, I found a note written in the “bubble” style of young feminine handwriting I know VERY well from grading hundreds of undergraduate geology assignments saying “PLZ DO NOT PARK IN CAR SPACES!!!”
LOL!
that is quite hilarious!
i have seen bikes of various kinds parked in Pearl every time i go down there for lunch, and i always assumed that it was cool with the city. it’s much better than having them take every space on Gay. there are cars parked there very often as well. i hope those were also ticketed. that seems a perfect space for some reserved bike parking to me. if they need to make some money off of it require a sticker or put in meters for 10-20 spaces. easy to fit in that area.
Motorcyclist and Scooterist friends of mine, living in New York City are often confronted with this situation. Their solution: Velcro license plates. They park in alleys or on the sidewalk, chain up, remove the plate and go about their business. In their experience, most meter-maids are not schooled enough to locate the VIN plate and therefor write a ticket and are unwilling to have the bike towed, thus the NYC kids park without being ticketed. Unfortunately, this only heightens the illegality of dealing with -as Emar said it best- a non-existent problem.
July 18th is ride to work day, I would love for the City of Columbus to put some meat behind their support for this day.
Yep. It would really be great to have some cycle parking around town where we would be free from hassle by THE MAN
Seems like two wheels in general gets a lot of harassment from the car culture in general. Sucks to fly in the face of the status quo sometimes. :D
?
:D
Here’s what I wrote in my blog about this:
As with the biker noted in the article I too knew I was living on borrowed time parking in the alley. I’m not going to argue the merit of being ticketed but I find it interesting that the construction workers who park their personal vehicles so tight sometimes you can’t squeeze between them in Pearl Alley, (abutting the State Office Tower – nice safety eh?), were NOT ticketed. I’m sure I know which door was blocked and I had concerns about that as well; with the exception of the door being blocked however there was zero interruption of pedestrian travel. The motorbikes are all lined up against the wall, bookended by the several dumpsters that line Pearl Alley.
Now I normally bicycle commute so this isn’t a huge deal for me but I agree that it was handled poorly and that the city has taken a step backwards in terms of making it desirable and welcoming to work downtown. If the public safety enforcer is serious about enforcing the parking based on the signs then NBC4’s contractor’s should owe one hell of a bill to the city. If the city sees (and they should) how beneficial it is to have motorbikes instead of cars, or worse trucks, driving downtown then they should do what other cities have done and make arrangements that are in line with the greatly reduced cost to infrastructure and time loss normally associated with larger vehicles.
************
Something to be clear about is that, in this case at least, it wasn’t CPD who wrote these tickets. I’ve talked with them and they could generally care less about us parking there. Unfortunately one incident is all it takes to spoil a good thing and that’s exactly what happened here.
?
:D
yep!
It’s not a conspiracy against scooters or crackdown by the City. It was one zealous meter maid named Dave who was summoned by a business owner who complained that a large motorcycle was blocking his entrance. A few people gathered, I understand, who heckled the ticket-writer to ‘treat ‘em all the same’ so he ticketed some scooters. I hear the meter maid felt bad about it and was embarrassed. He’s still moping around.
I bet it really would be embarassing. I bet ticketing a scooter feels a bit like going to the prom with your sister.
Fuck him.
If you have a serious problem with this or a similar policy, then you should ask to address the City’s Transportation and Pedestrian Commission (yes, it really exists). Call up the transportation division and see if you can get on the agenda.
If you have a serious problem with this or a similar policy, then you should ask to address the City’s Transportation and Pedestrian Commission (yes, it really exists). Call up the transportation division and see if you can get on the agenda.
Yes that is a good idea, however….
I spoke before the T&P commission – informing them that the city needs to think about providing motorcycle (and scooter) parking. That was, let’s see…. in spring 2007.
So not to be a downer, but they’ve known about this for a while now. Just so nobody starts taking time off work and re-arranging their schedule, thinking that if they can just inform T&P, then suddenly the City will start taking us seriously.
And sadly the T&P folks seemed painfully in need of informing. They asked me why I couldn’t just park at the bicycle racks. !! Of course that’s not the answer, and I told them so.
Fair enough. But if you don’t follow up, then how can you hold them accountable? It’d be nice if one request can make serious change, but it usually takes more than that.
One person might not be heard, but many people asking for something will generally get something accomplished. :D
is it possible to schedule a specific date for an audience.
june 19th perhaps?
i happen to have the day off and was planing on riding my scooter downtown and experiencing columbus.
probably park at a meter.
june 19th perhaps?
i happen to have the day off and was planing on riding my scooter downtown and experiencing columbus.
probably park at a meter.
Yes, Provocative.
Curiously enough, I too am off work on Thursday, June 19th, and plan on enjoying the offerings of the downtown area, while parking my ’61 Vespa at a meter.
quite the coincidence.
Oddly, I believe even if we decide to park on the same street… we would not, under law, be able to share a meter. So we would need to park at separate meters so as to avoid a fine.
Should we happen to park on the same street that is.
Should we happen to park on the same street that is.
Be prepared to each receive some kind of snarky note about taking up parking for REAL vehicles. It doesn’t count unless it has a 20-gallon gas tank, apparently. :roll:
i sure hope those snarky note leavers bring a lot of paper.
8)
and by 8) i mean :shock:
I don’t own a scooter yet, but I’ll gladly go stand in a parking space on June 19th. :D
I’ll come down and chain my bike to a meter…
Will that help?