People who have lived in Minneapolis for decades get their cars towed during snow emergencies for many reasons, but chief among them is confusion. The rules go in effect at odd times. There is a time by which cars have to be moved. There's probably even a grace period during which cars can be on either side of the street, but you pretty much have to call the snow emergency line every few hours for the first day and a half to make sure your car is where it should be parked. Or have an offstreet parking spot. If you live in St. Paul or a suburb with sane regulations and get stuck at work in Minneapolis during one of these snow emergencies, you'll probably get back to your most assuredly ticketed car before it has been towed. However, if you've recently moved here, the rules and enforcement can make you feel as though someone in charge of the rules is capricious, power-hungry, or about three years old. Last weekend I rode the bus sitting next to a woman justifiably complaining on a cellphone about her last 24 hours. First she talked about how she expected her insurance rates to go down when she moved here from Chicago, but now she's paying an extra $100 a month for car insurance because of high local auto theft rates. Then she talked about how she couldn't find a cab near her apartment on 13th and Hennepin. Finally, someone agreed to drive her to the shop she had to open (apparently, between Uptown and Loring Park) for $10 -- an outrageous amount, she thought, but necessary for her to keep her job. (I wondered if a cab would have cost less, but kept my mouth shut.) The reason she was looking for a cab came out next. Her car had been towed the day before. She had parked it in the evening in a spot that had already been cleared and that was the right spot for when she woke up the next morning. She couldn't understand why it had been towed and, I would have added (if I had thought it my place to confuse her further), why a policy -- supposedly for handling snow emergencies -- deals punitively with people who try to use common sense and don't know that they need a direct line to 348-SNOW.
Peace. N.S. Gill About Guide to Minneapolis/St. Paul http://minneapolis.about.com About Guide to Ancient/Classical History http://ancienthistory.about.com _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
