Cup o' Joe: The ultimate bad neighbor move

“Oh, no they didn’t!”

That was my first reaction when I witnessed four bright orange cones blocking off two parking spaces on Monmouth Avenue in Durham’s Trinity Park neighborhood. This issue was first brought to me by a friend.

Parking is sometimes tight — no question — which makes this situation even worse! Think about all the other neighbors who rely on public street parking now competing for less spaces.

Folks, I’m from Philadelphia, the land where #NoSavesies is often tweeted out by the police department.

Philadelphians have long been known to put just about anything — plastic chairs, trees, toilets, even “a grammatically terrible sign that threatens violence” — on the street to reserve a space. This gets even worse when a snow storm hits after spaces are shoveled! (I’m sure we’ll see some examples up there this weekend!)

I got to thinking: Can residents legally lay down cones in Durham?

The answer: No!

I reached out to Bill Judge, interim director of transportation, who said, “Residents are not permitted to utilize cones or other similar devices to reserve public on-street parking spaces for their exclusive use.”

Judge says the city issues permits for construction projects or moving vans, but in short, this neighbor is breaking the rules! Albeit a minor issue, he even said they’ll investigate this case.

At the end of the day, this comes down to being a good neighbor. The cones send a threatening message to other drivers to keep their cars away from those particular spots. Sure, other people can legally park in the spots. But if the cones are there, they must do so with the unnecessary pressure of what their neighbors will say or think.

Street parking is for all of us. We should keep it that way.

Have a similar problem in your neighborhood? Tell me about it by email or Facebook!