Resident Parking Permit Plan Has No Merit

The more we hear of the congestion pricing plan proposed by Mayor Michael Bloomberg and several colleagues and associates in city government, the more convinced we are that we are on target in opposing it.

The latest corollary to the plan calls for residents of some neighborhoods, especially those near subway stations or express bus stops, to apply for residential parking permits (RPPs) in order to park their cars in the neighborhoods where they live and so distinguish themselves from commuters who drive in, park and take public transportation to their ultimate destination. According to city Department of Transportation Commissioner Janette Shadik-Khan, the RPP program will "ensure that the parking scales are tipped in favor of local residents". We doubt it. This is an awful plan for New York.

Shadik-Khan explained in a release: "Under one possible plan, residents across the city, through their community boards, could request that curbside parking in their neighborhoods be restricted to local residents only for 90-minute periods each weekday. The city would issue annual permits only to those residents who show proof of vehicle registration within the permit area, and the permits would have to be displayed in the vehicle.

"This will prevent all-day parking by those who live outside of the neighborhood without shutting out people going to a doctor's appointment, visiting a friend or shopping in the area, while encouraging parking space turnover, benefiting local businesses."

It seems to us that Shadik-Khan's proposal would do the most harm to the people it claims to help: those residents of a given neighborhood who live in that neighborhood precisely because public transportation is readily accessible, even though they own cars. There are those who own vehicles, but use them only on weekends precisely because they can take public transportation to work, school or other destinations during the week. Car owners who live in neighborhoods in this borough and take public transportation into Manhattan are not likely to drive into Manhattan- or across it- unless they absolutely must, especially if a congestion pricing plan imposes a fee, toll, whatever one wants to call it, of $8 to $21 for traveling into Manhattan during certain specified hours is enacted. There are those who own vehicles, but use them only on weekends precisely because they can take public transportation during the week. The RPP proposal seems bent on somehow exacting some sort of a parking fee from anyone who owns a car but for whatever reason elects to avoid a fee imposed for traveling into another part of the city we all call home.

Some private communities in this city restrict street parking to residents, charge fees for non-residents and boot and tow cars that violate community rules. This is their right as private corporations. Public parking on public streets, however, is a different matter entirely.

Shadik-Khan correctly points out that on-street parking is already hard to find, with as much as 98 percent of parking occupied in some neighborhoods. Imposing a plan to require residents to secure permits to park in the same curbside spaces they have occupied without any sort of official notice- except for the occasional parking ticket engendered by violation of alternate side of the street parking rules- whether or not those parking permits come with a fee attached, strikes us as unfairly penalizing those of us who of necessity park on the borough's residential streets.

Congestion pricing already has many drawbacks that make it unfeasible for New York City. The RPP concept is even more unfeasible. This proposal has nothing to recommend it whatever.