A day after a somewhat bemused post about the irrationality of systems such as parking, the system bit back hard.
About a little before noon I went out to drive my truck downtown. On my way out I left the latest parking ticket with the front desk for them to call it in again. To say I was rather concerned when the truck was not sitting where I parked it, is even an understatement to call it an understatement.
I wanted to be confident it had been towed, but could not dismiss a worry it had been stolen.
Lucky me, it was only towed. Downtown. Because the parking pass the staff here writes for me expires on the last day of the month, and the rules are a pass is only good for one day.
The building manager was very frustrated too, because every time I have turned in the unwarranted ticket, he told the parking services person that this situation was wrong. Joel was more than helpful, he gave me cash to may the $140 towing fee and drove me down to pick it up from Mike’s towing.
Red Dog needs to be freed
I learned that the parking here on campus is contracted out to Imperial Parking Corporation of Canada. The people who hand out tickets are not employees of the university. One does not have to guess that there is a revenue stream with parking permits, tickets, and towing, so there is an incentive to aggressively ticket and to tow.
Because those are the rules.
Another souvenir from the Parking Services of Canada
That ticket was sitting in my truck at the towing lot.
The ticket was written at 9:21am and my truck was taken, without any notice sometime in the next two hours. They do not notify the staff at the residence hall. They do not have to. It’s the rules.
Beyond the belief for a bit that my property was stolen, beyond that the management here shelled out $140, beyond the two hours I could have been doing something useful, beyond the hours that Joel has to deal with this, beyond all that is nothing.
Nothing but rules. Stupid rules.
I went out for a movie today and in the parking lot was a Mike’s towing truck, strangely moving around slowly in the lot, like a big yellow vulture. It passed behind me as I unlocked my truck, and I delivered my dirtiest scornful look. The driver waved.
One does not need to be brilliant to see solutions, ones that might save time, aggravation, everything but ticketing and towing feeds. Allow the staff here to issue multi-day permits. Or rope off a portion of a massively underused parking lot for hotel guests.
But that would be too logical.
There are rules against that.
