In addition to the constant objections that I’ve been privy to, I was also curious about this entity that has been clocking my wallet in the form of parking tickets. Ergo, I decided to do my due diligence.
Let’s start at the beginning. Parking meters have existed since July 16, 1935, in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, the brainchild of Carl C. Magee. A newspaperman, Magee revolutionized downtown parking in Oklahoma City, and by early 1944 there were more than 140,000 parking meters in operation across the United States.
Now that I briefly covered how parking meters came to be, it’s time to discuss parking in the City of Chester. I sat down with Duane Lee, Director of the Chester Parking Authority, and Edwin Lanier, Manager of the Chester Parking Authority. The first thing I found out was that this isn’t the first time the city’s had parking meters. Chester formerly had metered parking up to about 1992. The parking lots across from the Chester Transportation Center remain empty mainly due to the absence of drivers who used to come in from other parts of Delco and take the train into Philadelphia because parking was free.
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