City wants curbs hugged

RALEIGH -- Plan on parking on a Raleigh street? Grab a ruler.

The number of $20 fines slapped on cars parked more than a foot from the curb has skyrocketed, from just 379 in 2008 to 4,587 in 2009.

A manager with Park Raleigh, a company contracted by the city to handle parking enforcement, said city officials asked it to pay more attention to the rule. Gordon Dash, the city's parking administrator, said it's a way of training drivers to park safely, not a way to generate money.

The tougher enforcement hasn't made for happy downtown denizens - or visitors who come back from errands, lunches and appointments to find bright orange ticket envelopes tucked underneath the wipers of cars parked within the white parking boundary lines.

Shonna Greenwell learned about the foot-from-the-curb rule when she parked on Hargett Street to grab lunch with a friend in late December and came back to a $20 citation.

"I wasn't out in the road. It wasn't like I was obstructing traffic," said Greenwell.

No signs point out the rule, nor is it listed in the seven-page brochure on parking rules on the city parking division's Web site.

Last January, just 58 tickets were issued citywide for the offense. In October, the peak of the increase, 679 motorists got cited for parking too far from the curb, according to an analysis of reports released by the city.

The jump meant more than $91,000 in fines, up from the $6,325 assessed in 2008.

Park Raleigh doesn't keep information about how many of those fines are paid and how many are dismissed, said Joshua Bowen, a manager. He also offered to throw out tickets for first-time offenders.

Most of the increase came after city staff repainted parking spaces on city streets in August and the fall using eight-foot-wide markers, said Dash. Motorists park in the newly marked spots thinking that they're in compliance as long as the cars' wheels are within the white lines.

That's not the case, Dash said.

The 12-inch rule is not new, nor is this the first time it has caused tempers to flare.

In 2006, a 72-year-old disabled man eager to check out the newly opened Fayetteville Street was given a ticket for parking more than a foot from the curb. Then-city councilman Philip Isley took up the issue and unsuccessfully tried to get the rule taken out of the city's ordinances.

Enforcement elsewhere

Parking officials in Durham and Charlotte say they have the rule on the books, but they ticket only if a vehicle is sticking out in a travel lane or causing a safety hazard.

"We enforce it only if they are outside the stall lines," said Joe Vallejos, who runs Durham's parking program and estimates only a dozen such tickets get issued each month in the Bull City.

Dash said Raleigh's parking fines are not intended to generate money but to change people's parking habits. He wants to see more cars off city streets and in the eight city-owned parking decks that usually have plenty of empty spots.

The city is ending its contract with Park Raleigh and plans on bringing parking enforcement back under the city's public works department by the end of May. That will coincide with the installation of $1.6 million worth of meters in downtown Raleigh, in front of bars and restaurants on Glenwood South, and in the N.C. State University campus area.

The switch came after mounting complaints about the way Park Raleigh operated, including aggressive ticketing and an appeals process that consumers felt didn't hear their concerns, Dash said. City Council members thought city staff would be more responsive to gripes from parkers.

The new pay stations will let residents use coins and credit cards to buy time and eliminate the places throughout downtown where parking is free for up to two hours, said Dash. Street parking on weekends and nights will still be free. Parking staff will also be notified immediately through hand-held devices when a meter runs out, something that Dash said will likely increase the amount of tickets being issued.

Greenwell, who wants to appeal her ticket, said she thinks ticketing for rules like parking too far from the curb sends the wrong message.

"It'll discourage people from coming downtown if they make these ridiculous expectations," she said.