Parents of a school in the Bronx are at odds with New York’s MTA after they received tickets for blocking the bus lane while dropping off and picking up their kids from school.
New York’s ABC 7 reports that parents of a school in the Soundview neighborhood of the Bronx are angry their cars are getting ticketed while waiting in front of the school. The parents seem to think that it’s OK to double park and block the bus lane. It turns out, the buses are not fans of this practice, and they’ve been ratting out the parents.
Similar to what other large cities are doing, New York’s MTA buses use on-board cameras that catch footage of vehicles in the bus lane as the bus moves through traffic. Once the vehicle is caught blocking the lane on a bus camera, the vehicle’s owner receives a ticket in the mail. Parents, seem to somehow be both oblivious and pissed:
They say there’s nowhere else to park and they are not even in the bus lane.
“This is totally unacceptable. Every day they are doing this,” said parent Nafiquer Rrahman.
Rrahman held the source of his anger, a ticket for double parking outside of his child’s school.
“They said we shouldn’t be double parking because the buses are taking pictures and sending tickets,” said parent Ashley Calo.
ABC says parents received warning before ticketing began and the ticketing process even gives parents a way out: a vehicle can only be ticketed if that same vehicle is captured on camera by two separate MTA buses. Only then will they receive a $50 ticket. This is all in addition to a five minute grace period for parking in the bus lane which drops to two minutes if a person is double parking.
While some angry parents are calling what’s happening a money grab attempt, MTA officials are saying there’s no hard feelings, they just want to keep the buses running on time. “It’s good for everybody in the Bronx, so many people depending on buses — for buses to be faster than walking,” MTA CEO Janno Lieber told ABC 7.