Daley's parking meter 'deal'

[jnglmassiv]

This thing just gets worse and worse. Yesterday, they announce massive meter rate hikes. Today, meter-holidays and free Sundays have been abolished. This is a 75 year lease!?!

I don't often feed meters in the city but I'm angry for everyone that does.

[WhyNot]

I'm almost afraid to ask - what are they raising the meters to? Which meters?

[2nd Law]

http://www.suntimes.com/news/politic...g02web.article

at the bottom of the article...

Chicago parking meters are the fourth major asset unloaded by the mayor. The sell-off started with the Chicago Skyway ($1.83 billion), continued with downtown parking garages ($563 million) and culminated in the sale of Midway Airport ($2.5 billion).

Daley sold off Midway? Pity he didn't do the same with Meigs instead of tearing it up in the middle of the night.

[Dinsdale]

I just can't get behind this idea of financing the present by leasing/selling assets. Aren't we eventually going to run out of assets to lease/sell?

Also, in every instance I have heard of - Skyway, Midway, parking meters ..., costs to the consumer/taxpayer increased dramatically. I'm not convinved the average taxpayer saw benefits outweighing the costs.

[MikeG]

It's one more nail in the increasingly ferrous coffin I call "will MikeG ever move back to the City?"

[Cluricaun]

Originally Posted by 2nd Law

Daley sold off Midway? Pity he didn't do the same with Meigs instead of tearing it up in the middle of the night.

No silly, Meigs is where the Richard J. Daley Memorial Casino was supposed to go until the state gambling board remembered that giving the city of Chicago a casino would be like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys. Now it's going to be some sort of Olympic slum run by Tony Rezko from prison.

[Whack-a-Mole]

I've given up driving in the city but this still makes me furious.

I actually live "in" Chicago...not a suburbanite. For that I pay crazy sales taxes on gas and so on ($8.50/pack of cigarettes...really). In addition to that I pay a hefty city tax yearly just to have a car then pay none-too-light parking fees for a spot at home (I could street park for free technically). For all that I am barred from parking in many neighborhoods since I do not have their Zone sticker on my car. Add in zealous parking ticket happy police (they even have special trucks with cameras that patrol and read license plates to get you).

Now they want to rape me some more? Fuck them...bastards...getting tired of being nickle-and-dimed at every turn. I appreciate the city needs revenue but how about cleaning up graft and shit like that first before fleecing me?

[dropzone]

If privatizing services is supposed to be so much more efficient than letting the city run them, then why will this new company charge as much as four times per hour?

[MikeG]

And why doesn't the city just increase the prices and keep the money? Fuckers.

[dropzone]

Because this way Richie can point at the big pile of money he got for outsourcing and blame the added costs on the company.

[Mr. Frink]

Worse yet-- this private company also has the right to make all meters 24-7 meters. No Sundays off, no holidays, no free parking after 9pm. So in a lot of neighborhoods, people won't be able to park at the meters overnight...so they'll have to park on the sidestreets. Which are usually full. There will not be enough parking spots in some neighborhoods to handle it....

[Musicat]

Originally Posted by 2nd Law

http://www.suntimes.com/news/politic...g02web.article

That article raises more questions than provides answers.

On Monday, the city received what a top mayoral aide described as a "winning bid" for Chicago's 35,000 parking meters.

Does that mean that the physical meter property is being sold? Or only the rights to collect the income? Who will set the rates (it will be a monopoly)? Does the purchaser have to rent the space they are sitting on or is that being sold or leased also? What about new locations or inactivating old ones due to street changes? Who decides that? What if there is a dispute about payment -- will that be a civil suit? Can/will cops write tickets for violations?

[Bob Ducca]

Originally Posted by Mr. Frink

Worse yet-- this private company also has the right to make all meters 24-7 meters. No Sundays off, no holidays, no free parking after 9pm. So in a lot of neighborhoods, people won't be able to park at the meters overnight...so they'll have to park on the sidestreets. Which are usually full. There will not be enough parking spots in some neighborhoods to handle it....

This will be a problem in my neighborhood. In Rogers Park where I live, there is a lot of dense housing and street parking is pretty much impossible after 7 or 8pm. We can usually find a spot up on Rogers Ave though at a meter spot. Looks like that's not going to work for us anymore.

[gaffa]

I have to say, I'm of two minds.

On the one hand, adding a profit motive to anything rarely makes it cheaper, and I'm generally opposed to privatizing any government service.

On the other, I've lived here in Chicago for 18 years and have never had a car, and don't want one. Anything that makes cars less attractive makes the CTA more so. The more people who use public transit, the better it will be. They'll add trains and improve stations and service.

[WhyNot]

Originally Posted by gaffa

I have to say, I'm of two minds.

On the one hand, adding a profit motive to anything rarely makes it cheaper, and I'm generally opposed to privatizing any government service.

On the other, I've lived here in Chicago for 18 years and have never had a car, and don't want one. Anything that makes cars less attractive makes the CTA more so. The more people who use public transit, the better it will be. They'll add trains and improve stations and service.

In the long term maybe, but it will be hell in the short term. The CTA has additional trains on order...but none of them will be available for "several years" cite. I've read as many as 10 years in other papers.

[carlb]

Originally Posted by MikeG

And why doesn't the city just increase the prices and keep the money? Fuckers.

This is what I wondered. I can actually get behind a meter price hike and fewer holidays as a way to discourage unnecessary driving and reducing emissions. IF there's a commensurate increase in funding for public transit and expansion/improvement of service. I have heard of no such plans, so the meter deal pisses me off.

We're bringing on all of this revenue, and at the same time we're seeing services cut (snow removal for example). And don't get me started on TIFs.

[Ed Zotti]

Originally Posted by carlb

We're bringing on all of this revenue, and at the same time we're seeing services cut (snow removal for example). And don't get me started on TIFs.

Been reading Ben Joravsky, I take it? This will warm his heart.

[carlb]

Originally Posted by Ed Zotti

Been reading Ben Joravsky, I take it? This will warm his heart.

Yeah. Thanks to him, I know that I live a block or so from one of the more egregious ones (the new Grossinger Toyota location). I'd hardly call the North/Clybourn intersection "blighted."