Friday, April 10, 2009

Speaking of life on Gay Street ...

I was recently enjoying a little time off campus for lunch a Little Havana, and after finishing my plantain walked out onto Gay Street to find my car being towed by my good friends at Floyd's Wrecker Service.


Now, clearly I was at fault. I parked in the loading zone on the Viaduct. However, all this to say that functioning on Gay Street is a pain in the neck (read: wallet). After paying off Floyd's Wrecker Service, I was talking to the cops there and they said that they waited a while (30 min) before calling Floyds, and that the loading zone was full of cars. At which point I began thinking about how my $10 lunch was now going to be an $80 lunch, and that I probably should have just stayed on campus and eaten the turkey sandwich that now sat alone and uneaten at my desk. 


Sadly my pleas for more lenient parking enforcement during this crap time on Gay Street went unabated. 

Diners and residents beware!

Photocredit - Todd Sparks' iPhone

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I've lived downtown for over a year now and have had my car towed 5 times (see $600 dollars) and gotten about 50 parking tickets. At one point while living in Emporium, I got 1 every single day because there is no where safe to park on Gay Street. I tried parking in Sterchi lot, got towed twice and parking tickets daily. Tried parking on bridge to some success, but normally had a parking ticket.

In 2008 I bought a residential parking pass, and to my grief, still got parking tickets.

I find it sad and pathetic that the cops can't police the completely insane homeless guy who comes up to me once a week talking to himself but has no problem punishing the residents that are paying to live downtown. Paying is definitely the right word....someone in office needs to shift priorities downtown so that living down here is actually more plausible for the average person.

The Pol said...

Ano you may be right. Someone should step up and run for office with a focus on downtown.

Hmm... you've got this Ol' mind a thinkin' again.

CK, Robert, meeting at the dank and dark Regas tonight. A few Martini's and we'll have another campaign together in no time.

Robert said...

Anon - I'd like to buy you a drink. I've got 5 parking tickets in my glove box since January.

Pol - I'm in Nashville for the weekend, so you'll have to have an extra martini in my stead.

Anonymous said...

I park in that loading zone a lot overnight, because I'm at my car before the 6am cut off. I got to sleep in last Wednesday and woke in a panic that my car was towed. It wasn't! I lucked out THAT time. I cant even count the parking tickets I've received over the past 5 years...both when I had and did not have parking passes. I gave up on that stupid downtown parking pass. What an idiotic, inefficient waste of money. The point of being a resident is that you ARENT going to move your car from a two hour meter spot every two hours. Dumb. It makes me really angry, actually.

Robert said...

honestly, parking is the number one reason i am glad im moving this summer

Aaron Thompson said...

I guess I should make an account since I keep checking into this website :x

Another aspect that really bothers me is that I own a business downtown, yet my commercial and residential landlord can't even get me a spot in one of the "private" parking garages downtown (there are a few most don't know about).

Anyhow, keep up the good work with this site. It's nice to vent my frustration and discuss Knoxville with other locals.

Todd said...

great photos.