Parking Placards

Only three days remain until 20 percent of government parking placards must be surrendered, but as Gridlock Sam wrote here last month, that should be just the beginning of placard reform. Case in point: Uncivil Servants featured a story last week of an Upper East Side synagogue that manufactures its own bogus placards while the 19th Precinct turns a blind eye and infamous Community Board 8 lends a hand. Uncivil Servants reports that employees of the Park East Synagogue on East 68th Street have been getting away with the printing of homemade placards since the attacks of September 11, 2001:

The New York Post believes a rash of car break-ins in Washington Heights and the Bronx may be related to the recent Bloomberg administration parking placard crackdown.

A commenter on Uncivilservants.org noticed that Mayor Bloomberg's attempt to reign in parking permit abuse is already being met with some good old-fashioned NYPD blowback:

Streetsblog commenter BicyclesOnly attended last night's DOT neighborhood parking workshop at Temple Israel on E. 75th St. Here is his account (originally posted here):

The following was contributed by Samuel I. Schwartz, AKA Gridlock Sam.

Another DOE employee not abusing a parking placard, courtesy Uncivil Servants

Over the weekend, City Council Member David Weprin and "Keep NYC Congestion Tax Free" spokesman Walter McCaffrey got a lot of press by casting doubt on whether congestion pricing revenues would, as promised, be invested in transit. It looks like a plan was already in the works to allay that fear.

Yesterday we wondered if the city might be convinced to reconcile its vision of a sustainable city with its anti-urban parking policies. We'll mark this one in the "no" column.

With its report released the day before, there wasn't a lot of news to be found at yesterday's meeting of the Congestion Mitigation Commission. There was, however, some good political theater and, with the deadline to produce a recommendation approaching, influential commissioners began staking out their positions.