Parking a Problem

DannyArcher said:

As far as the crosswalk, I'd spend more time trying to get people to actually use it.  People stream across the length of Maplewood Ave like herds of urban deer.  That's the accident waiting to happen.

Also an issue (NOT a defense of idiotic driving, or refusal to walk 2 minutes from a parking spot not on Maplewood Ave.).

But folks do stream off the 6:0whatever and spray off the train, heed nothing, and don't look. This IS a much worse situation in town that raises the % of serious accident. Commuters need crossing guards.

Not to defend pedestrian spraying (great image, btw!) but just pointing out that there isn't a sensible, safe, well-lighted, crosswalk-enabled way to get from the westbound platform to the NJT lot on Baker Street. 

ml1 said:

I walk that stretch all the time. It's been going on for a while. A guy going the wrong way there lost it on me for pointing it out to him. That was over a year ago. 

The "park like a tool" thread on MOL is almost five years old. This stuff has been happening long before the post office was closed. 

DaveSchmidt said:

steel said:

I have even lately observed a surprising number of folks driving obliviously the wrong way in the one-way Ricalton parking lot, WTF? 

I wonder if this is a sign that the village, specifically the Clarus, is drawing more out-of-towners.

ETA: Which would be a good sign.

Formerlyjerseyjack said:

Another problem in the evening is the people lined up in the driving lane of the train parking lot, cars idling, waiting to pick up a passenger getting off the train. Other cars cannot get by them to exit the parking lot. Cars cannot back out of the parking spaces because these cars are blocking the driving lane. This would be a hindrance to emergency services if the need arises.

For the sake of clarity, when you reference the train parking lot: do you refer to the lot off Maplewood Avenue opposite Kings; the lot off Dunnell Road; or the lot at Maplewood Avenue and Baker Street ?

Thanks for any help in better understanding your post.

TomR

They do need to fix the signage and paint new arrows, etc in the lot.

j_r said:

steel said:

a surprising number of folks driving obliviously the wrong way in the one-way Ricalton parking lot, WTF? 

Were some signs removed during construction and not replaced? The Ricalton lot was two ways for a short period over the summer and it seems as though some One Way or Do Not Enter signs were not restored. But it could be a faulty memory. 

I'm as tired as anybody about the rest of the misbehavior, particularly the blocking of crosswalks ("just for a minute"). But I confess that I sometimes hover at the corner of Woodland and Maplewood Ave. awaiting a backer-outer, as long as there's nobody behind me.

Yes there is.  People are too lazy to walk the extra 30 feet to the crosswalk by Arturo's.

j_r said:

Not to defend pedestrian spraying (great image, btw!) but just pointing out that there isn't a sensible, safe, well-lighted, crosswalk-enabled way to get from the westbound platform to the NJT lot on Baker Street. 

Tom_R said:

Formerlyjerseyjack said:

Another problem in the evening is the people lined up in the driving lane of the train parking lot, cars idling, waiting to pick up a passenger getting off the train. Other cars cannot get by them to exit the parking lot. Cars cannot back out of the parking spaces because these cars are blocking the driving lane. This would be a hindrance to emergency services if the need arises.

For the sake of clarity, when you reference the train parking lot: do you refer to the lot off Maplewood Avenue opposite Kings; the lot off Dunnell Road; or the lot at Maplewood Avenue and Baker Street ?

Thanks for any help in better understanding your post.

TomR

Jack is probably referring to the parking lot opposite Kings but that is not technically speaking a train parking lot since those are short term spaces.  Do adults really need a drop off/pick up zone at the train station similar to what we have at the district's elementary schools?

yahooyahoo said:

Yes there is.  People are too lazy to walk the extra 30 feet to the crosswalk by Arturo's.

That's just wishful thinking. The walkway from the train platform to Baker Street dumps pedestrians out at the entrance to a busy parking lot, on a blind curve under a train trestle, and the bump-out for Arturo's new seating has narrowed the sidewalk considerably. 

A simple, low-cost solution would be a flashing crosswalk at the end of the walkway to the other side of Baker.

while that is true, I think blaming our parking and driving shenanigans on out-of-towners lets our own townsfolk off the hook.  I suspect out-of-towners are probably more likely to obey the rules because they actually do things like read the signs. 

DaveSchmidt said:

ml1 said:

I walk that stretch all the time. It's been going on for a while. A guy going the wrong way there lost it on me for pointing it out to him. That was over a year ago. 

The "park like a tool" thread on MOL is almost five years old. This stuff has been happening long before the post office was closed. 

DaveSchmidt said:

steel said:

I have even lately observed a surprising number of folks driving obliviously the wrong way in the one-way Ricalton parking lot, WTF? 

I wonder if this is a sign that the village, specifically the Clarus, is drawing more out-of-towners.

ETA: Which would be a good sign.

ml1 said:

while that is true, I think blaming our parking and driving shenanigans on out-of-towners lets our own townsfolk off the hook.  

ETA: It was only the specific shenanigan of driving the wrong way in the Ricalton lot that made me think of out-of-towners, for reasons I don’t need to get into since my speculation has been refuted.

DannyArcher said:

rhw said:

Is this all too trivial for the police to police?

Yes.

No, and they do, but they can't be everywhere at all times.

ml1 said:



I know these threads and my rants don't change many (or maybe any) minds.  But I hope a handful of people who do this might think about the stuff I'm writing here and on FB and possibly stop doing this.  And for the rest of the people blocking crosswalks, I hope they get tickets.

Next time you see someone breaking the law please consider signing a citizen's complaint.

^^You don't need to call mommy and daddy every time you see bad behavior.  Feel free to make an on the spot correction yourself.  I know I do.  Save the police for more important things.

LOST said:

ml1 said:



I know these threads and my rants don't change many (or maybe any) minds.  But I hope a handful of people who do this might think about the stuff I'm writing here and on FB and possibly stop doing this.  And for the rest of the people blocking crosswalks, I hope they get tickets.

Next time you see someone breaking the law please consider signing a citizen's complaint.

while this is good in theory, realistically, I'm not going to make a trip to the MPD and then a court date to enforce this.  And even if I wanted to, given my frequency of walking through the village, I could literally sign off on a dozen complaints a week.  Actually, given that there are typically anywhere from 3-5 cars parked illegally in front of Kings many evenings a week, I could probably, without exaggeration sign off on 25-30 complaints a week.  I already have a full time job.

DannyArcher said:

^^You don't need to call mommy and daddy every time you see bad behavior.  Feel free to make an on the spot correction yourself.  I know I do.  Save the police for more important things.

the problem here is that some of these people are belligerent. I corrected somebody once, and when he exited the car yelling like a lunatic, I figured maybe correcting him had been a mistake.

The mistake was the other person's for acting like a nut, not yours for acting like a good citizen.

As I was backing out of a parking spot in front of Kings, a woman was planning to make a left hand turn into the spot.   I rolled down my window and told her that she could not legally make that left - after a few more exchanges, she said "why do you care?"  I do wish I had pulled back into the spot.  This happened a few years ago and I posted about it here - the bulk of the responses were along the lines of "yea - why do you care?"  I'm glad to see opinions have changed.

"Why do you care?" appears now to be the major opinion on SOMA Lounge.

DannyArcher said:

The mistake was the other person's for acting like a nut, not yours for acting like a good citizen.

not much consolation if the guy punches me

ridski said:

"Why do you care?" appears now to be the major opinion on SOMA Lounge.

The response could be, "Why do YOU care that I care?"  But that could go into some sort of death spiral with "Why do YOU care that I care that you care?" etc.