Parking Fine every 42 Seconds

Where?  NYC, LA, Chicago, London, nope, Australia.

Seems New South Wales, that Australian state where Sydney is located, has the numbers. one ticket every 42 seconds. 

Well, not really — actually some smart reporter just did the numbers.  They probably have no tickets written between say 2 and 5 AM and a much higher rate between 10AM and 2 PM.  However the numbers are telling.

The various municipalities in the area collect over $116 million in an area of 6.7 million people. Is that a lot. Lets see — New York City, with 8.1 million people in the five boroughs, collected $440,000,000 in revenue. That makes the Aussies look like pikers.  A bit of higher math tells me that if the fine folks in Manhattan collected fines at the same rate as the constabulary in Sydney, they would be down to $140 million a year. 

New York City collects 70% more per capita in parking fines than the most populous area in Australia. And I thought the folks who live with Kangaroos and Wallabies were the cowboys. Of course, a lot has to do with how much you "need" the money. With nearly half a BILLION dollars going in to NYC’s treasury every year from Parking Fines, wow — and from my sources, that’s just fines, not the 18% parking tax, the city should see the parking industry as a very VERY good friend.

JVH