The 3 People You Meet in Parking Meetings, Plus a Little Nighttime Entrepreneurship in EaDo

How’d that first public meeting about changing the city’s off-street parking requirements go? Andrew Burleson reports: “The crowd at the meeting was overwhelmingly comprised of three types of people.

• 1. People who were mad that strangers were parking on the street in front of their homes and then walking to nearby businesses.
• 2. People who were upset that strangers were parking on the street in front of their homes and then walking to other homes or townhomes on the street.
• 3. People who were worried that the METRO light-rail on Richmond Ave. was going to create a parking shortage.

While those voices are pretty common, there was another case that I thought was much more interesting.

One person voiced concern that in his neighborhood (East Downtown) there were a large number of abandoned warehouses, and that vagrants were coming to these abandoned properties, setting up a hand-painted sign reading “Event Parking – $5″, ushering cars onto lots they don’t own and charging for it.

The Police Department refuses to take action to stop this, because it’s happening on private property and the owner is not available to complain or press charges – and has not filed a no-trespass order.

The neighborhood cannot get the absentee owner to respond to the problem, or even communicate with them, so they’re not getting any help from the public sector on the issue.” [NeoHouston; previously on Swamplot]