Is "street sweeping" a scam to generate ticket revenue?

[Yllaria]

In Stockton, the sweeper comes around the day after trash is picked up, in residential areas. That’s every other week, most of the year, and weekly when they have trouble keeping up with fallen leaves. There are no signs and no fines.

The trees in our area are old and reach across the street. The whole street needs to be swept, not just by the curbs. If you don’t move your car, you’ll end up parking on a pile of leaves. I’ve always wondered if there’s something in the exhaust system that could ignite a leaf pile. I’m not willing to experiment.

Downtown, there are no parking signs for the early morning. That would clear the streets for sweeping, whichever day it’s done, and it would also prohibit overnight parking.

Most of the complaints about parking downtown are about the daytime parking limits. Most of it is limited to two hours and a lot of it is metered.

[minor7flat5]

@needscoffee

But how does this show that the reason the parking citations are given is to scam people? Of course they’re going to show how the revenue is allocated. What else should they do with the money, hoard it?

“Scam” was the choice of the OP. I wouldn’t use that word. I would, however, call this a conflict of interest. The chart shows that they would hurt if it were lost, so there might be less incentive to do friendly things like set the times to be more targeted (e.g. a two-hour range instead of a whole day).

[needscoffee]

@minor7flat5

I would, however, call this a conflict of interest. The chart shows that they would hurt if it were lost,

Yes, but what would we expect them to do with the money? Something unimportant or unnecessary?

The money should be allocated to where it’s needed.

[minor7flat5]

I think we are not on the same wavelength.

[md-2000]

My experience in many areas of Canada, they use not just salt but sand - IIRC from ski vacations, Calgary liked to use fine gravel too. Cleaning streets is a necessary step of spring cleaning. After a bad winter, it can be dangerous to ride a bike or motorcycle before the streets have been cleaned, due to the risk of hitting a sand dune while cornering.

As for revenue - well of course, it benefits the city to collect, but it also benefits them in getting parked cars out of the way. The real question is whether they give fair warning or like to “spring a surprise” to enhance revenue. (I’m thinking of those speed traps where the limit dips in a still rural-looking area well before it’s obvious it should, or with a sign strategically hidden behind tree branches.

[OldGuy]

@Yllaria

The trees in our area are old and reach across the street. The whole street needs to be swept, not just by the curbs. If you don’t move your car, you’ll end up parking on a pile of leaves. I’ve always wondered if there’s something in the exhaust system that could ignite a leaf pile. I’m not willing to experiment.

Catalytic converters can ignite a pile of leaves.

One of many cites:

Pile Of Leaves Catch Fire, Destroy SUV On Long Island

[Sage_Rat]

@Yarster

In a recent weekend trip up to Santa Monica, CA and around the beach areas of San Diego, there are signs warning you not to park on certain streets on a random day of the month (like the first Wednesday) because of ‘street sweeping’. Well, let’s presume for the moment that these streets are really ‘swept’ on that day. What also happens on that day is lots of people park on that street just like they did the other 29 days of the month but got a parking ticket.

Maybe someone already pointed this out but, at least in San Diego, these signs also consistently give hours like, “Between 2am and 5am”.

I don’t believe that these tickets are designed to catch people out. They’re clearly posted, the dates and hours seem reasonable, and the streets will probably be better cleaned by having fewer cars in the way. Personally, I like them because they create open parking spots due to all the people who can’t be bothered to read the whole ten words on the sign.

[puzzlegal]

My quiet suburb cleans the streets once a year, in the spring. But every city I’ve lived in cleaned the streets more often, and needed to. Yes, they really clean the streets. Yes, that’s really valuable. Yes, they benefit from the revenue from people who don’t move their cars. But more importantly, they force all the cars to move regularly, so people who don’t need to park in those high-demand zones don’t, and so the junkers get removed from the streets.

[Telemark]

On major streets around here they don’t just ticket, they tow right away. I’ve had my car towed from the front of my old office because I was there for an overnight upgrade and paid no attention to the street signs.

[carrps]

@The_Hamster_King

I live in Westwood a few miles east of Santa Monica and our neighborhood has the same rotating schedule for sweeping. Each side of the street has a four hour block once a week. The sweeper does come through (I’ve seen it) and the parking cops will ticket you if they catch you blocking the sweeper on its designated day.

I live in Playa del Rey, and this is exactly the same for us.

One of the dogs I had about 15 years ago loved to bark at the street sweepers if they passed us. I saw them often.

[Cartooniverse]

I live in Astoria, Queens, New York City.

My block has 4 days alternate side for 90 minutes per day. Wednesday is the grace day.

I’d always been appreciative of the street sweeping despite hating it and loathing the ongoing cost of parking tickets. ( About 12 years ago, we hit the tipping point: The monthly cost of tickets exceeded the cost of renting a garage nearby and we stopped parking on the street for the most part. )

Then COVID-19 hit. Because people were legally bound inside of their homes for the msot part, NYC Alternate Side Of The Street Parking Regulations were suspended - at the time, indefinitely.

For the first few months there was SO little street/sidewalk traffic that the streets that the curbside/ street filth was truly negligible. Then people started getting out a bit. Masks got sorted out. Bars were permitted to sell alcohol to go in plastic cups with lids. And shit got really…well, shitty in the street and curbsides. People started walking their dogs and picking up the crap into the usual small bags, then tossing the bags to the curb instead of handling them as required by both law and common decency.

It was brutal. Add to that the fact that garbage collection was slowed in some areas to once a week and things were filthy and smelly in the streets. Was it nice to leave our car closeby? Did it offer us a place to be safely that was not INSIDE?? We would sit, watching the sideview mirrors. When someone walked up the block we closed the windows till they were a few moments past the car. Never got sick then. It was a real gift.

Eventually, and it took a very long time, 1x a week Alternate Side parking came back to allow for the serious need for street cleaning.

I truly grok the resentment and optics of “they do this by the beach/ resort so they can slam tourists and tow their cars and line their municipal pockets etc etc”. There may be some of that happening. In New York City it is all about the rats. And other vermin. But mostly the rats.

So I applaud the return to 4x weekly street cleaning. Those driven machines with the huge stiff bristles TRULY DO sweep the curb lane 100% of everything as they move up the block. The more assholes who won’t move their car as the machine is approaching, the more filth is left on the block.

Depending on locale your mileage (heh) may vary wildly.