Watertown’s winter overnight parking ban has ended early!
The Watertown Police Department sent out the following announcement:
The Winter Parking Ban has ended effective immediately, today, Tuesday, March 5, 2024.
If there is a snowstorm in the next few weeks, it will go back into effect.
I understand the need for a ban when there’s a snow event coming, but to ban parking for 5 hours every night just because it’s cold out makes no sense to me. I rareley see a street cleaner, and emergency vehicles can pass with no problem, just like they do during the day…so please tell me what benefits do we receive as a result of this ridiculous ban? Aside from ticket revenue, of course…..
Clearly you have not lived through many winters here.
Though if the climate keeps changing to warmer winters with less snow then you will have a valid point.
Totally agree! The ban is ridiculous. They could easily just ban overnight parking during actual snow emergencies, like so many other towns do.
I wrote a long comment explaining why we have the parking ban in the comments on Nov. 30 of this announcement that you may find helpful
https://www.watertownmanews.com/2023/11/01/watertown-winter-parking-ban-dates-announced/
We have been over this issue many times. If you talk to people who have lived here for many years, they appreciate the ban. It discourages landlords from renting to too many people in their apartments and clogging the streets with extra cars. It allows for better controls during snow storms and discourages people from other cities, like Belmont, from parking on our streets because they have a year round ban on street parking overnight.
As some of the streets are being done over, like Highland Ave., the streets are becoming narrower due to the wider sidewalks. These situations negatively affect the residents on some of those streets as they can no longer park on both sides of the street or emergency vehicles may not be able to pass. Thus they are losing some of their street parking.
If something isn’t broke, it doesn’t need to be fixed.
I’m hearing an argument to retain the winter overnight parking ban because it keeps people out of our city, specifically by preventing “too many people” from renting an apartment and “clogging the streets with extra cars.” What is the definition of “extra cars” on a public street? I find the sentiments behind this post exclusionary and offensive. Many immigrant families live together in groups. People who want to move to Watertown should NOT be deterred with little obstacles to their enjoyment of their homes. The winter parking ban must rise or fall on the merits of snow removal alone.