TELECOM Digest OnLine - Sorted: Re: You Can't Foil These Parking Meters/Technology Makes it Easier

Re: You Can't Foil These Parking Meters/Technology Makes it Easier

Fred Atkinson (fatkinson@mishmash.com)
Tue, 6 Sep 2005 23:49:36 -0400

This article made me remember an experience I had when I was working
with SkyTel.

I was on a business trip to Colorado. First we ran all over Denver
optimizing the SkyTel paging system. Then we went out to Vail and
Aspen to work on the systems there.

I can't now remember if this happened in Aspen or in Vail. But it was
one of them.

They had non-metered forty-five minute parking zones. They 'chalked'
you as described in the article, an officer came by and typed your tag
number into his wireless terminal. It was time stamped into the
computer.

So, when another officer comes back by and types it in again and you
are over the time limit, the wireless terminal printed you out a
parking ticket.

We had parked our rental vehicle in a forty-five minute zone. I
neglected to notice what time we actually parked. We didn't expect to
be there for more than a few minutes. But there was a problem with
the equipment on the site and we had to stay to get it fixed.

When we returned to the vehicle, there was a parking ticket on it.
When I looked at the chalk time versus the time the ticket was issued,
the difference of the times was only thirty-eight minutes.

I called the parking ticket supervisor at the town hall, gave him the
ticket number so he could pull it up in the system, and asked him to
explain that one to me. I pointed out that the sign said forty-five
minutes.

He was reluctant, but he deleted the ticket from the system and told
us not to worry about paying it.

So much for modern technology. Fewer challenges, huh?

Fred

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