Regarding Newton’s Overnight Winter Parking Ban: I have lived in Newton for 37 years and, until recently, rented a writing space over shops on Commonwealth Ave., arriving at night and staying until 5 or 6 am. The office did not have off-street parking. Every night in winter I risked a ticket. There were no alternatives. The nearest public lot was half a mile away — not a viable option for a 70-year-old woman carrying a backpack with books, manuscripts, and a computer on icy streets at 5 in the morning. And while I may be one of very few Newton residents who needed overnight parking in a commercial area, there are plenty of others, including overnight caregivers, who need it in residential areas. This is not, as some have claimed, a matter of non-residents cynically commandeering Newton’s streets for free parking but, rather, about people working in Newton during extended night-time hours.
The justifications for the parking ban put forward over the years seem to have ranged from the simply false — that it is crucial for winter safety when the City itself reported no adverse effects to lifting the ban during Covid — to the downright convoluted: I once read in a City Councilor’s newsletter a note about the inconvenience of the ban being useful for advancing climate goals by deterring households from purchasing more cars than they can easily store, as if penalizing those who don’t have driveways would prevent those with spacious ones from purchasing a second or third car even if one was needed. I hope we can stop inventing justifications for a policy that is unnecessary and inequitable.
Joan Leegant
Newton Highlands
