Washington DC is, as usual, getting things backwards. First they raised the parking rates, $2 an hour in most places. Then the found that people didn’t like carring around a ton of quarters and that meters were filling up faster than they could empty them. What to do, What to do?
Now they are running tests including the use of meters that take credit cards plus a 700 space test of Pay by Cell Phone. Verrus is running the Pay be Cell test.
All this is fair enough, and congrats to Verrus on the test. But wouldn’t it have made more sense to do the testing before they raised the rates. By installing flexible meters or the phone system or both, the city would have had the flexibility to easily change rates, accept all kinds of payment options, and would have eased the pain when the new rates were installed.
Oh, I forgot, this is Washington DC.
JVH
