Parking in Manhattan

Parking a car in Manhattan is, as most people know, a really burdensome or expensive chore.

I have known people who let thousands of dollars of parking fines build up unpaid because they knew they would be moving out of state in a few years...(think the City tried to do something about this at one time but I don't know what happened).

At one time there was also a lot of vandalism of cars parked on the street and a surge of theft of higher priced cars from richer neighborhoods.

People said the Mafia controlled car thief gangs stole cars to order, and loved certain types of Mercedes autos, for instance.

Manhattan and to some extent the other boroughs are one of the few areas in the country where you can get by without owning a car.

I visited a small town in Massachusetts back in about 1977 (took the bus up) and a ten year old girl of the extended family I was visiting asked me where my car was.

I told her I didn't have one and she was dumbfounded. In fact, it IS so strange compared to the rest of America.

Of course, high gas prices get to me eventually in inflationary terms even though I am not out watching the spiral upward at gas pumps.