By Andrea Gregory

There are only so many parking spaces in the city, and a local ordinance with a 48-hour cap on how long a car can stay in any given space is designed to give everyone a turn. A law that has been in place for more than 10 years is now getting a lot of attention with several residents raising concerns about the practice.

However, Robert C. Trane, BOA president, said he is not quite sure what is driving it since ticketing is generated from resident complaints.“For some reason this has come up a lot lately,” said Trane. “This is not something the city enforces unless they receive a complaint.”

Even when a car is reported for having overstayed its welcome in a particular spot, a warning, allowing another 48-hour grace period, is issued before anything else, said Trane.

“There is a lot of leeway,” he said. “So I’m not sure why this is popping up. It always, as far as I know, has been driven by complaints.”

Thomas P. Champion, spokesman for the city, said the city issues tickets when a resident complains or when there is obvious evidence that a car has not been moved for more than 48 hours. Champion said if a car is buried under a mound of snow days after a snowstorm, there is physical evidence that it has not moved lately.

In the first nine months of FY 2006 the city issued 1,118 of these tickets. In the first nine months of 2007, that number has more than doubled with 2,498 tickets written to violators of the 48-hour rule. Champion said there are seven more parking control officers on the streets this year.

The law is meant to deter people from storing cars on the cities side streets. Trane said a lot of the time you can pick out vehicles on Endicott Street that stay too long. He said the street open to visitor parking and some of the cars seem to be simply stored.

“There are only so many legal parking places in the city,” said Trane.

However, Trane is not sure that the law is working as is.

“I think we are talking about extending the time limit. Maybe this should be extended,” he said.

Alderman-at-Large Bruce M. Desmond said started to question the current parking rule after one of his neighbor’s got a ticket. Desmond said he first thought changing the law to allow cars to stay parked for 72 hours would help. “But why 72 hours?” he said.

Aldermen plan to hold a public hearing to find out how residents feel about the parking situation and what sort of changes if any should be made to the current rule that means every 48 hours it is time vehicle owners to move on. Desmond said the board will most likely schedule the public hearing at the next meeting.

“I personally think we have to look at other options when it comes to how we handle traffic and parking in this city,” said Desmond.