The Examiner

Last year, over 54,000 (4%) of the 1.5 million tickets issued were contested in-person. Tickets will only be able to be fought by mail or e-mail. 

The DMV also plans to implement a “street-sweeper” camera program in 2008, by installing high-resolution cameras on the city’s fleet of street sweepers. 

The concept mounts forward-facing cameras, on transit vehicles and street sweepers, to take photos of an illegally parked car’s license plate. A citation is then mailed to the vehicle’s owner.

San Francisco, Chicago and other cities are looking at some similar forms of enhanced parking ticket enforcement to assist in cracking down on illegal parking. 

The elimination of allowing drivers to challenge a ticket in-person will undoubtedly receive criticism, as a potential violation of due process. Perhaps it will receive as much heat as the recent Virginia Civil Remedy Fees for bad drivers.

But could the ellimination of the in-court option just be a smokescreen to divert attention from the plan to implement ticket cameras?  

The new ticket camera program is estimated to increase the number of tickets issued (and associated revenue?) by 30% (400,000) in the first year.  

I assume if this ticket camera plan works, District parking enforcement officers may start driving the District’s main arteries during rush hour with similar cameras.  Now that would be progress - finally finding a way to ticket a high percentage of the drivers that cause traffic snarls by double parking and blocking traffic lanes during rush hour. 

Plus, if that happens, repetitive street-blocking delivery trucks (UPS, FedEx and DHL) could single-handedly pay for a new baseball stadium… in about a week.

Images – sweeper – Elgin Sweeper Co., gavel – Flickr

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Post from: The DC Traveler