Photo: Kyle Bray/WBZ NewsRadio
WATERTOWN, Mass. (WBZ NewsRadio) — City councilors in Watertown will decide whether or not to shorten the winter overnight parking ban to Jan. 1 to Mar. 1, instead of late Nov. to mid-March on Tuesday.
Watertown resident Jean Dunoyer, who has lived in the area for 30 years said he's never been a fan of the overnight parking ban. He has been campaigning to get rid of the ban altogether.
"I've always found the winter parking ban to be an unnecessary hardship for a lot of people who don't have access to all street parking. People need to get to their jobs, they have to use their cars, we don't have good public transportation really for a lot of jobs you have to go to at all hours."
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The city manager proposed the date change as a compromise while a parking study is conducted, along with new heavier fines. Dunoyer says many people have factored in the overnight parking fines as part of the cost of living in the city.
"I think it's taxing people who have the least amount of means to do so, because the parking ban doesn't affect people who have property that's big enough to store your cars off the street. It's a social justice issue, it's an economics issue, it's an equity issue."
Residents like Natalie say the winter parking ban is a huge inconvenience for her.
"There's one space designated for my apartment but there's two of us that live there so we have two cars so one of us always has to find kind of an alternate parking solution."
WBZ NewsRadio’s Kyle Bray (@KyleBrayWBZ) reports.