Dealing with Those Pesky RVs
A reader, Zach, submitted a question last week about RVs parking on his street in Hollywood:
I live on Gower, south of Sunset, and my street is always filled with homeless people living in RVs. Is there any recourse I can take to get them to leave? Are they breaking any laws?Technically, these folks are not breaking the law... yet. And all this can change in a matter of a few months all because LADOT got a new General Manager (Rita Robinson, formerly of the City's Bureau of Sanitation). For almost 18 months, the City has had an ordinance on the books that prohibits parking of recreational vehicles over 22 feet long and 84 inches high on City streets between 2am and 6am. This ordinance was not able to implamented because the Council wanted to allow for the loading and unloading (read: parking) of such vehicles on a tempory basis by permit only. Addionally, this ordinance could only be put into effect if signage was posted indicating the new rule. All of this was supposed to be done over a year ago, but just last week, LADOT issued a report acknowledging the plan they have in place to adhere to these requirements.
After many meetings, the City will be piloting these special districts in Council District 15 and 11 to see how the newly developed system works and to work out any unforseen kinks. The Department has already ordered signs to be placed and selected the pilot areas, following these steps:
1. December 19, 2007 -- January 9, 2008 - Identify one pilot Oversize Vehicle No Parking Area within both Council District 15 and 11 to test the signage and permit sales process.2. January 11, 2008 -- Oversize Vehicle No Parking signs ordered.
3. January 15, 2008 -- ACS Oversize Vehicle Parking Permit sales procedures will be fully operational. [ACS is the contractor that currently sells Preferential Parking District permits.]
4. Due January 23, 2008 -- Transportation Committee report and draft Council resolution authorizing the installation of oversize vehicle No Parking signs in the two pilot areas.
5. January 30, 2008 -- Council adopts resolutions establishing two pilot Oversize Vehicle No Parking areas.
6. February 4-22, 2008 -- DOT District staff write work orders to install Oversize Vehicle No Parking signs in two pilot areas.
7. February 22, 2008 -- Letters sent notifying residents of need to purchase permits before sign installation date.
8. February 25 - March 14, 2008 -- ACS sells Oversize Vehicle Parking Permits.
9. March 17, 2008 -- Oversize Vehicle No Parking signs installed and enforcement begins.
After a 30-day pilot period and working out any of the aforementioned kinks, LADOT will role out the program to the rest of the Council Districts in the City based upon request.
All that said, the best course of action would be to call 3-1-1 and report the vehicles often as "abandoned." As of right now, they can't park in the same spot for over 72 hours, or they would be subject to being towed away. You could also work to implament hourly restrictions, but this only truly works if they are overnight restrictions, which doesn't always work in areas where parking is a commodity like Hollywood, Palms, Reseda, HIghland Park and most parts of the City with high density housing. The best effort is to keep track of the license plates of these vehicles and continue to call them into the 3-1-1/LADOT so they can mark them to be moved. Another recourse would be to work with the Senior Lead Officer of your area to see if they can talk to the RV-parker to see if there is a better place, perhaps, for them to park.
There are a lot of ways to address this problem in the short term while we all wait for LADOT to roll out -- citywide -- this restricted parking plan for oversized vehicles like RVs.
photo from Eleventh Earl of Mar via Flickr