Any Experience Contesting Parking Ticket?

[RachelEllen]

I parked on the street right in front of my building yesterday. The spaces are not marked off, but there are meters along most of the street. Between the curb and the first meter, however, there is space for three cars before the beginning of the metered spaces.

Street

__Space 1____Space 2____Space 3_____Space 4____XX__Space 5___
Curb

I was parked in the third free space (space 3), just before the beginning of the metered spaces (the X's are meters). As you can imagine, the free spaces are almost always full. People come and go from the metered spaces. During the day I was in that space, people came and went several times from the first metered space (space 4). I wasn't too close to that space. Cars could easily paralell park in the metered space with several feet between my car and theirs.

Ok, so, I go out to retreive my car, and there's a ticket! It is for 'meter unpaid.' The meter indicated is the meter one car space over. I can only guess that the meter maid came along when there was no car in the metered space and figured I was close enough to the meter to count.

In case anyone wonders, the free spaces are completely legal. The curb is white. There are no signs. The other two cars in the free spaces didn't receive tickets. And mine is clearly a meter violation, not an illegal parking citation.

Anyhow, I'm going to contest the ticket. It's almost too much of a pain for a $25 ticket, but it doesn't seem right.

Does anyone have any experience with what to bring to a hearing? My bf points out that there is really no way to 'prove' that I wasn't in the metered space. Plus, I'm sure they get tons of stories all day along about unfair tickets. I thought of bringing pictures. I might even get bf to sign something and get that notorized. I could also bring up the fact that I have about 4 meter tickets in my past that I paid promptly, as they were in fact my fault!

Any other ideas? Or experience with this?

 

[barkley]

realize that some courts require 2 separate dates (so 2 days off work vs one)-one to put in your plea and a second to hear it (so they can call the metermaid to testify).

only experience we've had was when my husband was pulled over by a city police officer who explained that he (the officer) had been flagged down by another motorist who claimed to have seen dh run a red light (he did'nt) and when the officer explained he could'nt ticket dh cause he did'nt see it, the 'nutjob' insisted he pull over dh to 'facilitate a citizen's arrest' (officer said 'yes he can do it, then i have to cite you based on the complaint he files). dh ended up going to court but 'nutjob' did'nt show-cost him more to take the day off work but did'nt get a blemish on his driving record.