Meter failure rate is low
The collection of coins from parking meters in the City of Washington occurs at a minimum of two days per week. During the collection process, failed meters are also repaired.
On Friday morning, when your editorial about failed parking meters appeared, I happened to have just finished the collection and repair process, as I do from time to time when one of our maintenance employees is scheduled to be off. That morning, a total of 10 failed meters were repaired.
Even one failed meter is an annoyance and an inconvenience to the customer who has the bad luck of parking in that spot. There are more than 660 parking meters in the City of Washington, so the 10 failed meters found that morning represented a failure rate of between 1 percent and 2 percent.
Out of those 10 failed meters, three failed because they needed to have batteries replaced. In the other seven instances, the meters failed because parking patrons jammed them. They were jammed with tokens, which the meters will not accept, and with coins other than quarters, which will not register time on the meters.
For those visitors to Washington’s downtown who wish to avoid the hassle of fishing for quarters and feeding parking meters, I would recommend using the Crossroads public parking garage, which can be accessed by car from West Beau Street or North Franklin Street. Not only do customers avoid the hassle of feeding meters, but the cost is actually cheaper. The garage is the most affordable option for parking in downtown Washington, and best of all, the customers who use it have zero risk of getting a parking ticket.
Joseph R. Thomas
Washington
Thomas is the parking director for the City of Washington.