"a user who found out his campus only had 12 wheel boots to go around and bought and illegally parked 12 scrapyard cars that could be “sacrificed” so everyone else could park however they wanted."
Not all heroes wear capes.
Not all heroes wear capes.
Sure, it's a fun example how simple tricks can beat complicated devices, but this only benefits the people who willfully take up valuable parking space that others might want.
It's only a matter of time before the university will switch back to the boot, risking more damage to everybody's cars, or to good old towing, dragging up the price of getting your car back.
Everybody loses because of a few childish students showing off how they're so much smarter than the system.
"Those dang kids! Stay off my lawn!"
Taking up spaces with abandoned cars is a particularly miserable thing to do that makes the original underlying problem worse!
driving to college is not something you have to do. it's something you choose to do. parking is a side effect of driving, not a god-given right.
It seems like you are suggesting that some people have other choices than driving. There are a lot of colleges with no accessible public transportation infrastructure.
Many people don’t have the financial means to do anything else, especially when there isn’t the public transportation infrastructure to support them.
If there's truly no choice other than driving (which isn't really possible, because if driving alone is an option then so is carpooling), your income level has nothing to do with it. If there is a choice, then low income is not a reason to drive.
I was a low income college student who drove and public transportation was not an option for me. Outside of very large cities public transportation is often inefficient to the point that the logistics of attending college and having a job just don't work. Between my part time job and classes I wouldn't have made it to either on time if I took a bus. I sometimes carpooled, but I only knew a few people at the college and work/class schedules didn't often align enough to make ride sharing a possibility. So I bought a very crappy car and basically prayed to the gods every time I used it that it wouldn't break down. It wasn't ideal of course, but being poor never is.
And I was lucky. So many people have problems and commitments that make this situation a lot more difficult, like having a kid. Can you imagine relying on a slow public transportation system while also juggling school, a job, and child care? I can't.
I've seen a lot of these type of comments on HN and my takeaway is that an awful lot of us are totally oblivious to the realities of living in poverty. Although maybe the real takeaway should be that people in general are often bad at viewing the world from any perspective other than their own. I really wish people could be more understanding.
At the low end it is not really that expensive.
Initial buy in is like $1500, $1k for the shitbox, $500 for the paperwork you need to legally operate it.
Fuel isn't exactly cheap but it's not a lump sum so if you're poor you can manage.
Maintenance is solved by bringing beer and pizza to someone who does that stuff on the side (for any instance where the upper middle class would shell out hundreds for a licensed professional this is the solution the lower classes usually have). If something really catastrophic happens you get another shitbox and are late on your other bills.
Unless you live somewhere where public transit is both decent quality and cheap and parking routinely costs money then driving is often cheaper than public transit.
I’ve had cheap cars before and solidly subscribe to the Sam Vines boot theory: unless you can do all of your own maintenance, it’s more expensive long-term but the only option for someone who can’t swing the higher up-front costs. Around here (DC) this is often cited as a poverty factor in favor of better transit since these costs all add up and the many low-paying jobs require hours and/or locations which aren’t great for the limited transit options (e.g. if you work at a restaurant you leave around when the rail is shut down but the bus takes 90 minutes and driving means a ton of upfront costs plus $$$ parking).
but go on...
this is generalization at the next level.
Anecdotally, when I was in university, I saw parking fees for the spot that I paid for in my first semester go from $180 for the semester (13 weeks) to $600/semester in my 4th year. I think parking tends to be a bit of an issue at many universities across north america.
PS: I took the ten year professional student plan between working at Stanford for a couple years and consulting. I had half of my courses canceled in 2000 when they couldn't find lecturers because most were out making $250-500k in industry.
Yes but not a parking service. If you want to park, arrange that yourself somewhere else, like a private garage.
It would be unavailable to students who actually need it.
There's no way in a million years I could have afforded my own car as a student.
This sidesteps the underlying decision of who pays for those garages. Either you charge for parking and the people who use it pay, or you don't and every student (even the ones who take the bus or carpool) pay.
The point of DeCSS and qrpff, for instance, was not that piracy is a good thing but that DRM is a bad thing.
Everything else is about people trying to avoid being asked to take responsibility for the impact of doing that.
Also, what exactly would taking responsibility entail? How can individuals build public transit any more than they can redesign the movie industry? Holding individuals responsible for their single car's pollution sounds like holding then responsible for their plastic straws while ignoring the impact of major corporations on pollution.
I'm just sure it doesn't involve:
- failing to follow parking rules which you presumably agreed to when you matriculated
- refusing to pay charges and fines you presumably agreed to
- vandalism
- theft
- dumping of cars
- squatting on parking spaces
(Even squatting on parking spaces doesn't show a lack of responsibility for the impact of parking spaces occupying land - it's a calculated use of a small amount of a resource in order to aim for more of that resource in the future. You may as well say that someone who invests their money instead of keeping it safely buried in the ground isn't being responsible with their money.)
Of course people cheer fucking with that
+1