A Manhattan City Councilman says alternate-side-parking restrictions should end as soon as a street is cleaned.
“People wait in their cars sometimes more than an hour after the truck cleans the street,” said Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez (D-Washington Heights). “We’re talking about working-class people that have to be taking care of their family. They have to go to work.”
Rodriguez quietly introduced a bill last month that would open the street to parking once a sweeper passes through.
The bill will get its first hearing next week, and Rodriguez is planning a rally to support it on the City Hall steps Thursday.
“We hope to help thousands and thousands of New Yorkers that go through this experience every day,” Rodriguez said. “After the street is clean, people should be able to park.”
He says the measure would also reduce pollution by cutting down on time spent idling or driving around in search of elusive spots.
The Sanitation Department is still reviewing the bill, but spokesman Vito Turso said it could pose logistical hurdles.
Parking agents have no way of knowing whether a street has been cleaned when they come to issue tickets, Turso said.
And some streets require more than one visit from a street sweeper during no-parking windows.
“There may be a delivery vehicle blocking 30 feet [of the street], which can’t be swept,” Turso said “When that happens, we will make an attempt to come back. … We try to keep the streets as clean as we can.”
(Source: NY Daily News)
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5 Responses
In our neighborhoods we double park during street cleaning time. It would be impassable.
“Parking agents have no way of knowing whether a street has been cleaned when they come to issue tickets, Turso said.” Thats says something about how the streets are cleaned.
Let the law only allow the agent to follow the street cleaner ticketing any car that is blocking the cleaning process.
Or have the street cleaner keep records of when each particular street is finished & make that info easily accessable via internet or 311 & any ticket issued after that street was cleaned can be easily dismissed without a judge.
Will this affect Brooklyn or only Manhattan?
Geenfield should arrange something like this for Brooklyn.