No Parking Any Time

Gus Philpott
Woodstock Advocate
May 20, 2010

What does "No Parking Any Time" mean? Not much.

Recently the City of Woodstock took out two parking places on Church Street at Jefferson Street, in order to give pedestrians a fighting chance of crossing Church Street without ending up in Centegra Hospital. The parking spaces had been there for years, even though State law prohibits parking within 20 feet of a crosswalk at an intersection.

So Woodstock removed two parking places by posting "No Parking Any Time" signs.

The next step should be to paint no-parking lines on the pavement or a yellow curb to make it clear to drivers that they are about to park in a no-parking zone. I can see (sort of) where it might be possible to miss seeing one of the signs while a driver is still in his car. Once he has exited his car, he ought to be at least curious about the sign and signpost right alongside his car.

Do the police ticket violators? Not enough yet to cause word to spread. You'd think that a merchant would warn his customer who had just parked there, but maybe not. It's no skin off his body? Well, maybe it is, if a customer gets mad enough and stops shopping there.