Teaches > How to Park for Free at Meters
If you live in any city or busy town, you probably get jacked quite often for an expired meter. In my city those parking enforcement bastards are writing you up seconds after the meter expires. And how about all the money in quarters you dish out? I bet if you added it all up you could feed a small country….those bastards are taking the food out of poor babies mouths!
Well, here is a handy way to never have to pay the parking meter and park scott-free for hours. You will get really good at this and you will never put another quarter in the meter again…(except of course when your mother is with you)
FYI: This does NOT work on the newer digital meters. (I’m working on that)
1) take a business card (or any semi-thick paper): tear 1″ off of the end and 1/2″ off of the bottom (you should have a rectangular piece of card measuring about 2-1/2 x 1-1/2 now) if you have a matchbook: open it up and tear off the cover ane half of the back (that should leave you with a 1-1/2″ x 2-1/2″ rectangle as well) Any piece of semi-thick paper can be torn into these dimentions. (the envelope from a parking ticket works well too!)
2) fold the paper in half lenghth-wise and then fold it in half length-wise again. You will now have a pretty thick peice of card now measuring about 2-1/2 inches by 1/4 inch.
3) walk up to the meter (don’t get nervous nobody pays any attention to someone putting change in their meter, silly) and insert the folded card into the quarter slot until the paper stops. It’’s best that the card is thick and takes a little effort going into the slot. As soon as the card is about half-way in the slot, turn the crank on the meter all the way (this will take a little effort). Turning the crank will pull the card into the slot further. Turn the crank all the way until the yellow “violation” sign appears at the top and sticks. Do not try and turn the crank back in the other direction as this may kick up the red sign (ticket). The point is to jam the meter into it’s “broken” position which is the yellow “voilation” sign. When the violation sign is up THEY CANNOT TICKET YOU. You can stay there indefinantely if they don’t chalk you…If they chalk you (and this is VERY rare) you get about 2 hours (depending on the meter zone ie: 2 hour max etc.)
4) tear off any ends of card that may still be protruding from the quarter slot. (if you’re really socially concious you can leave it sticking out, then when you return you can pull out the entire card and the meter will be as good as new….but I wouldn’t reccomend this as sometimes the metermaid will pull it out herself and then another one will come by later an give you a ticket)
5) test the crank and make sure it’s jammed well…If you done it right the crank will be so jammed that you can’t even turn it back)
6) go on your merry way and rejoice in the knowlege that you saved another dollar toward the starving children’s fund.
Remember: when the yellow “violation” sign is up on the meter you are fine. This just means that the meter is broken and you have immunity from tickets when you’re at a broken meter. After a while you will do this without even thinking about it. Remenber to keep plenty of cards or matches in your car.
Note: just in case the metermaids try to crack down on this meter-terrorism, don’t have your goddam name on the cards or papers you’re inserting into the meter.
Again, once you get the hang of it this system is flawless and I really don’t think the metermaids care that much either since they can easily pull the paper out when they open up the meter to collect the change.
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If this is too much for you (and I am not actually encouraging you to do the above) then I can tell you something else. Meter’s are only monitored for so many hours in a day, most of them are not monitored after 6pm. They all tell you on the back of the meter when they stop monitoring. This simple fact a LOT of people miss, so there are always metered spots open at night.
Original Author: Don’t Know
Source: Some guy who hates parking tickets
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