Everyone that lives in DC knows that extra parking tickets are just another unwritten tax. They placed the tricky meters in business districts and issue tickets early, I witnessed this myself. They place the “speed cameras” on commuter routes to get the people coming into the district for work, it’s an unwritten commuter tax. This is why we avoid going into the district and if we do, I park in a garage and follow the cabbies because they know where the cameras are.
There has been an uprising over the past few years because locals have been caught in the net and they say they can’t afford the tickets. It was okay when others were paying but not for them.
I was a Program Manager with a contract that had my office in downtown DC on K Street and there was motorcycle parking right across the street in view of my office. Three of us commuted year-round on our motorcycles because it was faster and the parking was much cheaper.
Anyway, one day I was in my office with one of the men who had his bike parked next to mine. We had arrived at about the same time and we had over an hour left on our meters but we viewed a morbidly obese parking maid writing a ticket while standing next to our bikes. My coworker ran down and showed her but she told him if he did not back off she was going to call a real cop and have him arrested, so he ended up with a bogus parking ticket. They are just extra taxes, especially on the commuters and workers.