Brace yourself, Concord. The solstice may be a few weeks away, but winter appears to be here.
And with it, the dreaded parking bans. Two weeks ago, the Capital City got hit with enough snow to trigger the city’s first city-wide parking ban of the season.
On Nov. 16, the city ticketed 70 cars and towed 39 of them, said deputy city manager of redevelopment Matt Walsh. Christian Ave, a short strip that connects Ormond Street and East Side Drive in the Heights, got hit the hardest with 9 tows. Perley and N. Spring Street saw five tows apiece.
Less than a week later, downtown parking was shut down as the city cleared more snow from the area.
If you’re not a fan of winter, the Farmer’s Almanac’s prediction for the future isn’t optimistic. “Frosty Forecast Melts Rumors of Mild Winter” its website proclaims. It promises a “teeth-chattering” 2018-2019 winter season, with “above-normal snowfall” for New England on the way.
With that in mind, we thought we would remind you what winter parking in the city looks like, and how to avoid a costly night.
Concord has three kinds of parking bans. They can be triggered for different reasons.
City-wide bans, as one might expect, encompass the entire city. If you’re parked on the street anywhere when the ban is in place, you risk ticketing or towing.
Winter maintenance bans are often referred to as “downtown parking” bans, and for good reason – they’re called only after a storm in order to remove snow from the downtown area.
The area defined as downtown stretches from the S. Main and Perley Street intersection to Court Street; Storrs Street (including beneath the parking lot); all roads between Storrs Street and Main Street; all streets between Centre Street and Pleasant Street below Greene Street; and portions of South, Pleasant and Centre Street. For a map, visit the city’s website.
Emergency bans can affect the downtown area as well, and sometimes other parts of the city.
Bans always take place at the same time, between midnight and 7 a.m. According to city policy, they must be called 8 hours before they kick in.
Flaunting a ban can mean serious expenses for a motorist.
A ticket will run you $100. Any ticket that goes unpaid for 10 business days doubles in cost and quadruples after 20.
If your vehicle gets towed by the city, the penalty immediately doubles. Starting December 1, a towing fee costs $125. Retrieving your vehicle from where it was towed before 8 a.m. or after 5 p.m. costs $60. You’ll be hit with a $55 storage fee for every 24 hours you don’t retrieve your car.
Those fees are negotiated between the city and the towing company each year, and the towing companies pocket the various fees.
Should the city tow your car, there are four places it could end up: BRC Towing, Above All Collision Center, Patsy’s Auto Body & Alignment, and John’s Wrecker Service, Walsh said.
Revenue from tickets from snow-related parking bans certainly adds up: last winter, the city had 11 winter bans and issued 332 tickets for $32,000. They towed 147 vehicles.
Concord utilizes email and text alerts that anyone can sign up for and makes efforts to publicize the bans on its websites, on social media and through media outlets.
They also try to publicize that parking in the city’s three municipal garages is free when the ban is in place. Those garages are on School, State and Storrs streets.
With the new parking hours that went into effect July 1, motorists can park for free in the garages from 7 p.m. to 9 a.m.
(Editor’s note: A previous version of this article contained incorrect information about how much revenue was generated by the city’s winter parking ban last year. It has been updated.)
(Caitlin Andrews can be reached at 369-3309, candrews@cmonitor.com or on Twitter at @ActualCAndrews.)