Page 36 - MIN ECEM

A32 FEATURE
Wednesday 1 november 2017
Oklahoma City, where parking meters began, modernizes system

By JUSTIN JUOZAPAVICIUS areas,” he said.
Associated Press “It sparked a renaissance
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — in our inner cities.”
The city where parking As automobiles became
meters were born more more common, down-
than eight decades ago is town traffic jams irked mer-
phasing out the last of the chants.
coin-gobbling contrap- Store owners complained
tions that reshaped Ameri- that most of the cars
ca’s downtowns in favor of parked near their store-
computerized models seen fronts were owned by
in many other places. people who worked down-
Parking meters came into town, alienating potential
the picture as the streetcar customers.
age gave way to the era Commerce won out, and
of the automobile, remak- the parking meter was
ing urban transportation born, in part, to keep traf-
and the way civic planners fic moving.
and business owners imag- Millions of meters be-
ined commerce centers gan springing up in cit-
for more than three gen- ies throughout the United
erations. States.
But old-school analogue
meters have been disap- In this Wednesday, Oct. 11,
pearing, as cities have 2017 photo, Wade Beal, park-
been investing in the digi- ing meter technician, answers
a question during an interview
tal ones that take plastic, in Oklahoma City.
along with coins. Associated Press
The changing technol-
ogy has meant Oklahoma solar-powered kiosks fea-
City’s parking meters have ture a “pay-by-plate” sys-
been operating on bor- tem, though it will still have
rowed time. some older models through
Their guts date to the 1960s the end of the year.
and 1970s, and many com- Motorists’ mostly hate-hate
panies that once serviced relationship with the park-
them have long been out ing meter began in 1935,
of business. when the first one sprouted
“The companies just plain here.
and simple don’t support The collective rage, like
the technology anymore,” most things, worked its way
says Cory Hubert, Oklaho- into popular culture.
ma City’s parking services Paul Newman’s beer-swig-
manager. ging title character in the
This oil-and-gas hub’s new 1967 movie “Cool Hand
In this Wednesday, Oct. 11, 2017 photo, Will Cross, reads the di-
rections on a parking pay station in Oklahoma City. Oklahoma
City, where the parking meter was invented 92 years ago, is
doing away with the last few hundred of its coin-operated ma-
chines.
Associated Press

Luke” lops the heads off Cities came to rely on the
parking meters lining a steady revenue from the
nearly deserted downtown meters — and the fines for
drag. failing to pay— to pad cof-
“It was an iconic opening fers.
scene; it was this act of Those fines aren’t going
rebellion,” says Bob Black- away.
burn, executive director of Nor are Oklahoma City’s
the Oklahoma Historical five meter readers, much
Society, where the inaugu- to the chagrin of 20-year-
ral Park-O-Meter No. 1 is on old barista Marina Lozano,
display. who says “they’re so ruth-
“That director knew that less.”
everyone hated parking And not everyone thinks
meters.” newer is better.
A pain, maybe, but Black- Stay-at-home dad Will
burn said their influence Cross was hunched over
can’t be overstated. one of the new units on a
“The parking meter is a recent afternoon, trying
perfect example of a pivot to find out where his ticket
In this Wednesday, Oct. 11, 2017 photo, Wade Beal, parking meter technician, inspects a parking point on how people got was before the machine fi-
meter in Oklahoma City. around in American urban nally spit one out.q
Associated Press