No More Free Sunday Meter Parking in SF

With a new year comes new challenges for those who own a car in San Francisco.

Photo by sjsharktank via Flickr.

Starting today, parking enforcers will issue warning to drivers parked in expired meters from noon to 6pm. On January 27, those warning will be replaced with the standard-issue tickets that many of us are already familiar with.

The Municipal Transit Agency offers this explanation:

“Parking has traditionally been free on Sundays since parking meters were first installed in the 1940s. At that time, most businesses were closed on Sundays, so there was no need to use parking meters to create parking availability. … The primary goal in charging for parking is to make sure that motorists can easily find a place to park in commercial areas, which is currently very hard on Sundays.”

San Francisco collects about $47 million from parking meters each year, and this this move is expected to another $2 million to pot in its first year, according to a report from the Chronicle. It’s the first time in 65 years San Francisco drivers will be forced to pay for meters outside of heavy traffic areas on the waterfront.

Matt Crawford is content director for Boulevards New Media, Inc. and Metro Newspaper and managing editor of SF Station. Follow him @Metro_Matt.