Officials this month upheld a $30 ticket for a woman visiting family in New Canaan who had inadvertently parked in a loading zone on Forest Street.
The parking area across from Embody on Forest Street. This is where it happened.
Jennifer Gubilaro told members of the Parking Commission at their most recent meeting that she had been going to Embody Fitness Gourmet for healthy drinks each morning, and found herself parking on either side of the street as close to the business as possible.
Though she noticed the striping directly outside of Heritage Square, Gubilaro said during her appeal hearing, she only noticed the white lines on Forest Street designating the various parallel parking spaces and not the signage indicating a loading zone.
“I just parked on the left and I looked on the street,” she said during the hearing, held at Town Hall. “I noticed those white things you park inside of and I thought it was a regular parking spot.”
It is, though for a few hours in the morning it’s a loading zone, according to a sign. Gubilaro said she had parked there about 9 a.m. (it’s a loading zone from 7 to 10 a.m.)
After brief deliberations, the Commission upheld the ticket by a 3-2 vote. Commissioners Peter Ogilvie, Pam Crum and Chris Hering voted to uphold while Stuart Stringfellow and Keith Richey, the group’s chairman, voted to void. The vote followed a similar case on Main Street during the same public hearing, and the Commissioners voted the exact same way.
Crum said she wouldn’t void a ticket if there’s signage instructing motorists about parking rules.
Asked by Richey if she would vote to uphold, Crum said: “If there is a sign there, yes.”
Gubilaro said that “if there was something on the ground” she would’ve taken notice, but that she was unaccustomed to looking at “telephone poles.”
“It’s just that you got caught by the switching” of the times when the space is prohibited to all but commercial delivery traffic, Richey told her.
Gubilaro was not technically on the Commission’s agenda for the hearing, and Crum noted that for that reason, the group had no documentation or photos at hand to prepare for the hearing and show how she parked relative to the sign.
When Richey noted that the space is “signed but not striped,” Parking Manager Stacy Miltenberg said that’s because “it turns to two-hour parking,” adding that there are arrows on the sign showing where the loading zone is.
“I can bring a picture to the next meeting,” she said.