There is a better solution to parking on Third Avenue than permits: Let’s put meters in!

Shiny ones, lighted and with parts that move and make happy noises. They should be painted orange – blaze orange – to make them easy to find. Let the meter heads be extra large, so nobody will miss them. Oh, and hang doggie bag racks from the meter posts, for obvious reasons. And won’t there need to be trash containers for those filled bags? Let the meters be coin-fed only. Let them be two-hour meters and be required 24 hours, so we get those downtown service employees to pay their fair shares, too. It’ll be a small sacrifice that they who park there will have to shuttle out to the meters every two hours – all night long, every day, rain or shine, holidays and Sundays (church services excepted, of course). Where there are meters shouldn’t there also be benches? And while we’re at it, let’s install large, bright street lights (hooded to preserve the night skies), so that they who feed the meters can do so in the safety of a well-lit area.

Permitted parking on Durango’s streets is a joke, as bad a one as the above.

Neil A. Bourjaily

Durango