Free Parking

Riddle us this, Batman: what does it mean if there's no parking to be had in the city, yet revenues made from parking meters isn't nearly what it should be? Give up? Well, so has everyone else because nobody can quite figure it out. And nobody's really happy about it.

According to Budget Analyst Harvey Rose San Francisco's 23,000 meters or so average between $2.61 and $5.59 a day. That's about three hours of usage on the meters. Over the past three years, the city has made about $77.6 million from parking meters which sounds great until you realize that they had forecast $83.5 million. It's also a problem when according to the numbers, we're only collecting about 22.3% of what we should be collecting. One of the biggest mysteries about the whole thing is the fact that the lowest collection rates were downtown where parking is usually around $3 an hour. Which raises the obvious question of why in the place where the meters are the priciest, less money is taken in?

As for the cause, MTA spokesflak Judson True gave the Board of Supes Budget and Finance Committee a variety of answers, including broken meters, lack of parking meter maids, rise in handicap placards, and more yellow zones. They also said they need to study the issue a bit more.

The Board of Supervisors, led by Jake McGoldrick, are calling for more meetings on the issue.