March (Parking) Madness 2026: Like A Rock Edition

Like the NCAA, our Final Four bracket is set in this year’s March (Parking) Madness competition. Unlike in year’s past, however, we are confining this year’s analysis of police parking misconduct solely to Staten Island, where, fortunately, there are just four precincts. Here’s how the battle shapes up:

A lot has changed since the last time we did a Parking Madness contest (in 2023) — most important, the NYPD received a sternly worded letter from the United States Department of Justice (once the most trusted name in departments of Justice) demanding that NYPD cops stop leaving their garbage cars in the way of pedestrians and in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Also since then, we have a new police commissioner who, say what you will, does seem to want cops to be more professional.

But how will all these developments affect the four commands in the city’s suburban borough? Let’s meet our competitors!

The 120th vs. the 123rd: The Blue-Gray Bowl

For this competition, we pit the northernmost precinct on Staten Island with the southernmost, hence our Civil War-themed subhead. Who will take this semi-final battle? Let’s find out:

The 120th (St. George)

The most urban-like command on the island is, as we’ve found in year’s past, the most chaotic and messy. The station house itself faces Richmond Terrace, and is fronted by a line of combat-parked squad cars, plus a few high-ranking brass.

Compared to what we’ve seen over the course of this competition, it wouldn’t be that bad … except that the line of perpendicularly parked cars turns eastbound Richmond Terrace from a wide roadway with two lanes and a painted bike lane into a very narrow, single-lane roadway where cyclists are forced into the remaining lane (which, oddly, has a 30 mile-per-hour speed limit).

A sign indicates that car drivers can’t make U-turns … unless they’re cops. Above the law much?

Beyond that, parking spaces on both side streets adjacent to the station house — Wall Street and Hamilton Avenue — are completely full of parked officers’ personal vehicles. On Wall Street, they’re not illegally parked because signs indicate both sides of the street as “NYPD Only” parking, but on Hamilton, cops just park on the sidewalk with their handy placard.

The station house also has one of the longest stretches of “NYPD Only” parking we’ve ever seen, stretching two avenue-length blocks near the Staten Island Ferry Hawks’ minor league baseball stadium. Again, nothing illegal here, but the neighbors must be furious that all the parking is taken up by cops’ personal cars. Also, many of the cops just put an old parking ticket on the dash with the number “120” scribbled on it.

Worse, Inspector Eric Waldhelm’s cops are some of the worst drivers we’ve ever seen.

Of the 40 personal vehicles we spotted parked outside the station house either in official parking or illegally parked with a placard, all but two had been ticketed for speeding in school zones or running red lights. Of the 38 who had been ticketed by enforcement cameras, 33 had been slapped multiple times, including:

• One cop with a fake placard who has 36 speeding tickets and four red-light tickets.
• One cops with 47 speeding tickets and 10 red-light tickets.
• One cop with 11 speeding tickets (and, illegally, no front plate).
• One cops with 19 speeding tickets and five red-light tickets.
• One cop with 25 speeding tickets.

Of the 40 cars, the average number of speed-camera and red-light tickets is 10. That’s a disgrace — and a danger to the community.

123rd Precinct (Tottenville)

Welcome to the sleepy town of Tottenville! The old station house is (aw, so cute) on Main Street, and there is virtually no “NYPD Only” parking to steal space from the neighbors.

There’s no combat parking.

There’s no illegal parking.

There’s barely even any placard parking!

True, they took the screen door off the station house, but everything else is more or less as it should be. The worst we saw? One of Captain Kevin Russell’s cops has 18 speeding tickets.

And one cop was parked illegally in the “no standing” zone, but he didn’t have any tickets at all.

So who should advance? You have until Wednesday to vote:

The 121st vs. The 122nd: Will the real turkey stand up?

Now we have two mid-Island commands vying for a trip to the Big Dance. Let’s meet the competitors:

The 121st (Graniteville)

Completed in 2013, this Rafael Viñoly-designed, aluminum-sheathed cantilever is the dream precinct. It’s gorgeous, of course, but the architect clearly knew about police officers’ egregious parking because there’s literally nowhere to combat-park!

The entrance features a circular driveway that even the commanding officer, Captain Gzim Palaj, wouldn’t park on. And it’s so chill that some of the local fauna hang out (right).

Just as in Tottenville, if there is a parking transgression being committed by a 121st cop, we didn’t see it (it’s convenient that Viñoly gave the cops a huge parking lot on the south side of the station house, hard by the Baron Hirsch Cemetery.

I spotted just two placard-parked cop cars along Richmond Avenue: One guy has 33 speeding tickets and 10 red-light tickets (bad!) and the other has no speeding tickets since August 2023.

The only visible turkeys at this command are the ones on the driveway. Meanwhile…

The 122nd (Grant City)

This standard-issue station house faces onto busy Hylan Boulevard, so there’s no combat parking (though there is combat in the form of an American flag mural by notorious right-winger and speed-camera defacer Scott LoBaido that has been on the front face of the building for at least a decade).

All of the egregious parking happens on Elmtree Avenue, which dead-ends at a garbage pit. That roadway is filled with officers’ private cars combat-parked like other police facilities, even though the station house has a big parking lot in the back.

It’s all pretty chill, so we ran the plates on all the police officers’ personal vehicles that were littering the public space. The worst we saw was one cop (surprise! The one who was parked fully on the sidewalk) with nine speeding tickets and one red-light ticket. The 11 cars parked there averaged four speed- and red-light tickets. Bad, but not the worst thing we’ve ever seen.

So which of these two precincts should make it to the finals? You have until Wednesday to vote: