Alternate side parking

Alternate side parking is a traffic law that dictates on which side of a street cars can be parked on a given day. The law is intended to promote efficient flow of traffic, as well as to allow street sweepers and snowplows to reach the curb without parked cars impeding their progress. Some proponents also regard the law, which can be quite inconvenient for drivers, as a way to encourage the use of public transportation.

In many towns and cities, alternate side parking is reserved for certain times of year, or only used during a snow emergency.

From the beginning, the New York City alternate-side parking law was "assailed" by opponents as actually impeding the efficient flow of traffic. The system was created by Paul Rogers Screvane, former commissioner for the department of sanitation in Queens, New York.

The law is a year-round rule, suspended only for holidays and certain events. Signs are posted with the scheduled street sweeping times, and drivers must make sure their vehicles are on the correct side of the street or risk being ticketed or towed. The law can be confusing to visitors, who often choose to park in high-priced parking garages or use valet parking rather than risking fines. Even for locals, parking tickets are common; working late or oversleeping may cause a car to be left for too long on the wrong side of the street. Avoiding a ticket can consume a great deal of time, as drivers must search for other available spaces or sit double parked until the designated time, regardless of when street sweepers actually pass.

On a street running east to west, cars must be moved from the south side of the street for a few hours a day every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. On Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday they must be moved from the north side. On Sunday and certain holidays, they can be left where they are. The specific times will vary from street to street. The days on which the rules are suspended may also vary from city to city and even from neighborhood to neighborhood.

In Sweden, alternate side parking (datumparkering) is applied in zones covering an entire city, with signs indicating this at the city perimeter. Inside such date zones (datumzon), parking is prohibited on the morning of odd dates on the side of the street where houses have odd numbers. The drivers must think of what date it is the next morning if they leave the car in the evening. Inspired by , more and more Swedish cities are abandoning such confusing zones and instead provide permanent parking on one or both sides of the street, with the exception for one day per week during December through May, when snowplowing and sweeping of sand can be required. The day when parking is prohibited is posted on a sign for each street.

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Wikipedia