I read Gary Washburn’s “Getting Around” column (Metro) regularly and enjoy it a great deal because I find that it allows me to commiserate with my fellow commuters.
On July 15, I read Mr. Washburn’s column concerning Chicago police selectively ticketing illegally parked private vehicles. Mr. Washburn wrote that these cops were giving fellow cops a break while ticketing the average “Joe Motorist” who may have committed the exact same offense.
I, too, believe that everyone should get equal treatment under the law, but sometimes equal treatment in the media is needed even more. Why stop at writing about the underpaid cop who works long hours under tough conditions just to make a buck? The city’s gentry are the ones who really thumb their noses at the law.
Case in point: The Women’s Athletic Club at Michigan and Ontario (just up the street from the Tribune Tower). What’s the deal here? On a daily basis, from early in the morning to until at least the end of the workday, the club members park illegally in a tow zone in the right lane of Ontario Street with impunity. Their cars often block the lane all the way from Michigan Avenue to Rush Street at times creating major traffic problems. Can’t these people afford the ample parking that exists within a stone’s throw from the club’s doorstep? Or are they flaunting their power and prestige to elevate themselves above Joe (or Jane) Motorist by parking illegally and getting away with it?
I could also write paragraphs on all the media vehicles, from TV station trucks to newspaper staff cars, that are parked illegally, not because of some earth-shattering news story but because the news folks are at some restaurant eating.
Please consider addressing these inequities. These people not only create traffic hazards and tieups by parking illegally, but their disregard for the regulations is a slap in the face to those of us who try to obey the law.
