L.A. Gets Tough on Parked Cars on Major Streets

Tired of illegally parked cars blocking busy thoroughfares at rush hour?

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announced Monday that the city was cracking down -- by sending out a special rush-hour team of 15 parking enforcement officers and 10 tow trucks.

First stop: Wilshire Boulevard.

“Vehicles parked in the rush-hour restricted zones will be immediately cited and towed,” the mayor said during a news conference held at rush hour on Wilshire, where he and other city officials waved goodbye to the first cars towed under the new initiative.

Villaraigosa set aside $1 million in the city’s current budget for the rapid-response squad, which city officials have dubbed the Tiger Team. Tiger stands for Totally Integrated Gridlock Enforcement Resources.

The team began tougher enforcement this month along Wilshire. If it’s successful, it will move on to other major thoroughfares.

Transit officials say they hope the cost and inconvenience of illegal parking will deter drivers from blocking streets. Violators will be fined $65 and charged $144 for towing, plus $33 a day for storage, if the vehicle is not claimed within an hour of its removal.

They did not say which streets would be next.

Allene Park, 23, applauded any effort to ease her morning commute. “I’m always 10 to 15 minutes late for work,” she said, blaming illegally parked cars and road construction for delays between her Pasadena home and the Cingular Wireless store on Wilshire, where she works.

Each day, more than 66,000 bus riders and as many as 120,000 vehicles share the 14-mile stretch of Wilshire from downtown Los Angeles to Santa Monica, transit officials said.

The commute can be exhausting. In some heavily congested areas, it can take drivers up to 19 minutes to travel just one mile, according to a Metropolitan Transportation Authority traffic study.

Councilwoman Wendy Greuel said she wanted to double the fine for illegal parking to “make it painful to people who impact the rest of the drivers on this street.”

Parking is prohibited along much of Wilshire during peak traffic periods, from 7 to 9 a.m. and 4 to 7 p.m.

UPS driver Alex Gutierrez, 31, of Norwalk already has seen evidence of the crackdown. On Monday, he parked on a side street to pick up a package at the Citibank branch near Normandie Avenue.

“Every day, as soon as it hits 4 o’clock, you see all these tow trucks and cars getting towed,” he said. “We’ve been getting tickets every day.”

Although his company pays the fines, Gutierrez said, a daily parking ticket could affect his personal driving record.

“I got scared,” he said.