Parking Meter Vandalism Calls for New Tactics

In Canada’s St. John’s, the capital city of Newfoundland and Labrador, there has been a parking meter massacre like no other.

In three years, more than 1,000 meters have been decapitated costing the city up to $1.5 million in repairs and lost revenue, reports ctvnews.ca.

Chef Todd Perrin, co-owner of Mallard Cottage restaurant, has watched the parking debacle unfold with amazement.

“I’ve been fortunate enough to travel around a fair bit and I’ve never seen anything like it,” he said in an interview. “It’s not like a random one here or there. It’s almost as though someone is systematically going around trying to destroy every single parking meter in St. John’s.

I don’t think it is “almost as if” – it’s definitely the case that someone is systematically destroying every single parking meter in St John’s.

I’m thinking an armed parking meter is in order. One that shoots poison darts if it’s disassembled without a code. Or maybe one that splatters pink paint all over anyone that breaks its cover. There could be a camera in the housing recording images of vandals and assailants.

From the little I understand about the manufacturing of parking meters, maybe an easier and less violent approach would be an air horn of some kind. Criminals hate loud noises. If the meter is subjected to an impact beyond a certain amount of force, it emits a beep, ding, chirp, ring, blare or blast – the louder the better.

There are a lot of noises out there trying to alert us to something urgent or important. The ping ping of the debit machine, the car alarm honk, the cell phone chimes. It couldn’t hurt to add another to the list: the distinctive shrill scream of a parking meter under attack.

Read the article here.