Barangay SOS

In our city, we have this on again-off again campaign against illegal parking on the streets. In case you’re wondering, there is such a thing as legal street parking, where parking is allowed on one side of the street.

Unfortunately, most of the streets in my city are narrow, strictly two lanes only, one going in each direction. So when there are cars parked, even on one side only, it becomes difficult, especially for large vehicles like garbage trucks, not to mention fire trucks in case of emergency. There was, in fact, a case I think last year when fire trucks could not reach the house on fire because parked cars and tricycles were blocking the road.

The city government has posted big “No parking” signs all over, and in the beginning of this campaign it worked – the cars were gone, and those that were left were clamped.

Unfortunately, the cars are slowly being parked again on the streets, especially at night when I guess the residents are home. I see many cars parked right under the “No parking” signs!

In our residents’ chat group, we are told to take pictures and report to the barangay to have the cars clamped or removed. So far it hasn’t really worked; some residents say that some of the parked cars actually belong to barangay officials!

I understand that many houses do not have enough garage space; but is parking in the public streets the answer? — Mila Chua-Gomez, San Juan City