Unplated cars need to be tagged, towed
Maybe it’s time for Toronto police parking enforcement to get tough on auto shops that park vehicles without licence plates on the street.
Our Tuesday column was about a car dealer and muffler shop that temporarily parked unplated vehicles on Sackville St., often with two wheels pulled up on the sidewalk.
A parking enforcement supervisor told us they can order the vehicles towed, even if they don’t have a plate number for ticketing. But he said the offenders play “cat-and-mouse” with parking police by quickly moving them when an officer arrives.
That prompted email from readers who say the city doesn’t seem interested in cracking down on auto shops that park unplated cars on the street, because they don’t have enough space on their properties.
“I remain skeptical about the likelihood of change,” said Rick Owens, who first told us about the Sackville situation, noting that parking enforcement told him they can’t do anything about it. “Two weeks ago I spoke with yet another parking enforcement officer who reported that he was told that a bylaw enforcement officer had visited the Sackville muffler shop just the day before.
“He told me this as we both stared at three cars parked on the sidewalk without plates. This is such a curious example of inertia, ignorance or corruption.”
David Harvey says an auto shop on Queen St. E. “regularly parks unlicensed vehicles on Wineva Ave., “usually near the corner, and also road tests vehicles by driving them up and down Wineva without a licence.”
Haig Misakyan said auto shops next door to his business are “illegally using our leased property to park cars for which they do not have a spot on their own property.
“They have been asked to stop, because they are creating hazardous conditions for fire truck access and it effectively blocks access for tractor trailers delivering or picking up products from our warehouse.
“At this point, we seem to be powerless to do anything about it.”
Stephen Benjamin, a former traffic operations manager whom we often dealt with before he retired in 2007, emailed to say he crafted revisions to the Toronto Municipal Code, shortly before he left his job with the city.
“A specific provision was put into the code to make it an offence to park a vehicle without plates or without valid plates on any road, including sidewalks,” said Benjamin.
“This gives the police full authority to tag and tow unplated vehicles.”
So why don’t they? Here’s a theory: Parking enforcement is numbersdriven, with officers judged by tickets issued and revenue generated by fines. More time and effort would be required to tow a couple unplated vehicles than to issue a dozen parking tickets. In other words, the catand mouse will continue until the cat gets serious. What’s broken in your neighbourhood? Wherever you are in Greater Toronto, we want to know. To contact us, go to thestar.com/yourtoronto/the_fixer or call us at 416-869-4823 email jlakey@thestar.ca. To read our blog, go to thestar.com/news/the_fixer. Report problems and follow us on Twitter @TOStarFixer.