vanessanaylon:

I respect the City’s need to maintain order and collect revenue. Nevertheless, the first parking ticket I received from those bicycle-helmeted rascals was tantamount to a declaration of war. I thereby resolved to milk San Francisco for as much free, possibly illegal parking as possible.

I’ve developed the following guerrilla tactics for successful parking in San Francisco:

Pick your battles. You’ll never win against a tow-away zone. That’s a parking enforcement goldmine! Also, citizens will still call a tow truck on you for parking in white zones during business hours or parking in driveways.

Know your parking holidays. Save on parking costs by knowing when it’s legal to park on the street or at a meter. Check the holiday enforcement schedule.

Break big rules at night. The parking gods sleep at night, which means free blue zone (disabled parking) after 10 pm! Hydrants are safe too, on side streets.

Review parking tickets for errors. 1 of 3 tickets I receive is erroneous: I have an out-of-state license plate, but the officer specified California on the ticket (CA is probably default). These tickets can be thrown away – no one will ever find me to enforce the ticket. Make sure your ticket is valid before you pay it.

Check for chalk marks. Some (not all) parking enforcement peeps mark the side of your tire with chalk and record when they did it on your street, so they can come back and ticket all the chalked people when time’s up. If you see chalk on your street-side tire, wipe it off for extra time.

Press your luck in low-traffic neighborhoods. In quieter neighborhoods like Pacific Heights, parking enforcement swings by less often, so you can usually get an extra half hour out of your 2-hour parking zone.

Rain = free parking. On days when it rains heavily, the parking people do less work. Forego your parking lot fee and get a spot closer to work.

Wait an hour after street cleaning starts. Zoning allows 2 hours for street cleaning, but most street cleaning is done within the first hour of the time window. Does the street have a telltale slime trail? Take that space!

Re-use dashboard tickets in parking lots. For parking lots where your proof-of-payment is a dashboard-displayed ticket, save a paid ticket and reuse it another day. In some parking lots, the odds of your being charged the maximum fee are low, thereby making it a good risk.

Good luck!

There’s a good reason I love this woman.