June 16, 2006

Problems with illegal parking

       You only need a loaf of bread. It’ll only take a second.  So you pull up in front of the supermarket and park in an area marked with bright yellow stripes.  Admit it: Even though you know it’s wrong, you’ve parked in a fire lane.  In White River Township, firefighters say this act of convenience has become a problem that could rob emergency workers of precious seconds in saving a sick person or fighting a fire.   Last month, White River Township and Bargersville firefighters began writing tickets for people who leave their vehicles in fire lanes and in front of fire hydrants. In late February, county commissioners approved an ordinance to give fire marshals from those departments the power to write the tickets.  Firefighters wanted to be able to address the problem and not merely rely on police departments.  The worst offenders in Center Grove are shoppers at the Kroger store on State Road 135, White River Township Fire Department Fire Marshal Eric Brown said.

         The problem is countywide, but how it is enforced differs.  Under state law, parking in restricted areas is illegal, and police can issue tickets. The White River Township ordinance lets firefighters who act as fire safety inspectors issue tickets too.  In Greenwood, police and four firefighters can write tickets to motorists who park in fire lanes or in front of hydrants. In Franklin, only police can issue a ticket.  During his 20-year career, Greenwood Fire Chief Steve Dhondt said that about once a year illegally parked vehicles hinder firefighters’ response to an emergency.  “You have to adjust, and that lessens what you can do to fight that fire,” he said.  Vehicles parked in the fire lane could interfere with ambulance crews rushing to bring a heart-attack victim out of a store.  “You don’t want to have to roll 200 feet to an ambulance because there are cars parked in the lane in front of the building,” Brown said.  If vehicles are left in front of fire hydrants, it keeps firefighters from getting enough slack on fire hoses to keep water pressure up while fighting a fire.  “It’s like in (the movie) ‘Backdraft,’ where they break the windows in the car to run the fire hose through. We want to prevent that from happening,” Brown said.

         Firefighters are not out patrolling to look for illegally parked cars. However, they now have the power to ticket violators as they see them, Brown said.  About 20 to 25 tickets have been issued in the Center Grove area so far.  “This emphasizes state law and makes it more local,” he said.  The $15 collected for each ticket goes into a fund that is used for fire education programs.  New software will soon be available on firefighters’ laptop computers, which will keep a record of license plate numbers of drivers who have been ticketed. This way, firefighters will know if a violator has been ticketed before.  In Greenwood, most of the tickets are written during the holiday shopping season for motorists who are parked in front of major retailers or Greenwood Park Mall, Dhondt said.  “We write 90 percent of citations for blocking fire lanes during that 45-day period after Thanksgiving,” he said.  (Reprinted with permission from the Daily Journal)
 
    
 

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