Stealth Parkers in Tel Aviv Get Warning Summonses

Tel Aviv Municipality has put drivers on notice that overnight parking at illegal red and white curbsides and on sidewalks will no longer be tolerated, Globes reported on Tuesday.

Tel Aviv residents will complain all the more of an acute shortage of parking space.

On Tuesday morning, numerous parking offenders on the sidewalk of Shaul Hamelech Boulevard found tickets on their cars. Not the 500 shekel fine for parking on a sidewalk, but a “warning ticket,” announcing the city’s new policy.

When asked about it, parking wardens were not all on-message, though. One said that full fines would be handed out in a few days, but another warden told a driver that a permanent policy is still being deliberated.

Meanwhile, the municipality’s website scolded: “The sidewalk is not the road! Tel Aviv-Jaffa Municipality is giving back the sidewalk to pedestrians and tightening up parking violations enforcement with an emphasis on prohibiting parking on sidewalks, as part of the municipality’s policy of giving back sidewalks to pedestrians, due to the proliferation of those using them.”

It also said that enforcement will be extended to other neighborhoods later in the year. Fines will be meted out to red and white curbsides as well, it said.

In April 2018, more generous terms for handicapped residents were introduced, with 3,500 roadside parking spaces allocated, reducing the minimum available public parking in the city. In addition, 500 street-side parking spaces were taken away from cars and allocated to Autotel, a per-ride shared rental car company, and other spaces have been allocated to motorbikes and other two-wheeled vehicles. Parking areas have also been given to the shared electric scooter rental companies, Globes said.

However, the municipality maintains that it is working to “make things easier,” citing a number of changes, including: free parking for residents by blue and white curbsides, doubling the number of “close to home” car parks and increasing annual discounts for residents in car parks belonging to Ahuzat Hahof to 75 percent.

The city also notes that it has been promoting mass transit and “invested tens of millions of shekels annually in expanding infrastructures and bicycle paths etc. The number of residents’ parking permits remains unchanged,” it said in a statement.