Not so Neighborly

 

 

 

 

Did you know that you can’t park your car on an unpaved surface in Ontario, CA?  I recently found that out when I found a bright yellow citation from the Code Enforcement Division for parking in the dirt next to our driveway. 

 

Believe me – having a paved parking area for my car is on the list of home improvements. I just wish I had known there was a code against it sooner so I could have pushed the driveway project ahead of the tool shed Dave built for me that’s become Mimi’s Clubhouse.

 

 

When I moved into my current address last August, I didn’t think that parking was going to be an issue. There seems to be plenty of parking along Fourth Street, but there is no stop sign between Mountain Avenue and San Antonio Avenue so people tend to speed making it a very dangerous road. Half the people on my block who have parked on the street have had their vehicles hit by speeding cars. The first week I parked overnight in the street, the side view mirror on my car was knocked off; I found it in the gutter, two doors down. That was a minor inconvenience. My poor next-door neighbor tried to have a taxi cab business, but when he had to park on the street because a different neighbor had complained there were too many cars in the driveway or some such nonsense, his parked taxi was rear-ended by a hit and run driver and so he lost both his vehicle and his source of income.

 

 Our driveway is short and narrow. If Mama doesn’t pull up far enough, my car’s rear end hangs over the sidewalk. Thank goodness I didn’t get a citation for blocking the sidewalk because the fine for that is even higher than for the one I got for parking on an unpaved surface. We have a lot of foot traffic from people walking to and from one of the shopping centers on the corner of Mountain and Fourth. People walking, skateboarding or pushing strollers have never had any complaints about me parking on my own property.  In fact, many pedestrians stop to chat about the Little Free Library that sits in our front yard.

 

 

 

Rumor has it that it is a single neighbor who requests special attention be paid to violations of city ordinances that only he seems to be aware of. However, if this particular neighbor was really concerned about following protocol, he would not have an illegally constructed room addition behind his house.

Ontario has many ordinances and laws that create revenue for the city. I wish that the politicians were more concerned with traffic safety instead of ridiculous ordinances that only get cited when a nosy neighbor complains to the city instead of walking down the street and telling me in person, “Hey, did you know that it is against city rules to park on an unpaved surface? You could save yourself a fine by keeping your car on the driveway or street.” Instead, I get snuck up on at 6:30 in the morning at the same time as our household is supposedly receiving a “gift” from him. Some neighbors are not very neighborly.