Meter Maid courtesy

Gus Philpott
Woodstock Advocate
November 27, 2010

On Wednesday morning I met a friend for breakfast, and we parked our cars in a metered zone on the street in front of the cafe. I noticed that the meter had a button for ten free minutes and pushed it. No luck. So I fed three quarters into the meter and set my phone alarm to ring ten minutes ahead of the 90 minutes of street parking I had just purchased.

Breakfast lasted about 80 minutes and, when we came out, a meter maid was doing her duty and addressing the parking violation of the vehicle parked between our cars. As I walked to my car, she inquired politely if she was ticketing my car. It appeared she would have stopped writing the ticket, if I had responded with a "Yes." But she wasn't and I didn't.

As I entered my car, I noticed another customer from the cafe walk to her car, loaded down with carry-out baked goodies, and the meter maid and she had a short conversation, after which she left without a ticket.

I wish I had gotten the meter maid's name or badge number. I'll be writing a letter to her boss and complimenting her courtesy and awareness. Sure hope I don't get her in trouble for being a kind City employee!