New Bedford Guide Your Guide to New Bedford and South Coast, MA
“I recently read your New Bedford Guide article concerning the increase in parking tickets, and I definitely agree that the amount of tickets are sometimes out of hand.
I work for a restaurant in Downtown New Bedford, which means during weekdays, I’m paying almost $4-$5 a day just to park downtown. After a while, this adds up, especially on a college student budget. I completely understand that tourists paying the meters downtown helps bring in revenue for the city, but I find it unfair when citizens from the area are helping the city by working for shops and restaurants, but are penalized for going over a meter time. I pay every single time, but sometimes, I can’t just leave the tables that I’m serving to go and pay the meter again because that can be seen as unprofessional and sometimes it’s just too busy to leave.
The other day for example, I was very busy and I was fined for not paying the meter again. When I went outside and saw my ticket, the guy who was patrolling that street had given a ticket to every single car on that street. Another time, our chef was given 5 tickets in one day because it was so busy that she could not leave the kitchen to go pay the meter.
Again, this upsets me because we are working for New Bedford and bringing in revenue for New Bedford. I think the city should allot parking passes to employees in areas such as Downtown where meters need to be paid. It makes our jobs more difficult because rather than being more attentive to our jobs, we’re paying more attention to the time and making sure we aren’t fined for parking.
Thank you for taking the time to read this, and I hope that these articles can bring forth some sort of change to make the lives of the employees of New Bedford easier.”
Have a story to share? Send them to mike@newbedfordguide.com.
