I live in an apartment complex that has assigned parking spaces for each unit. Each unit comes with one assigned spot and if you want to you can try to find someone that doesn’t have a car or a unit that is vacant to lease another spot from. Since the winters in Chicago make street parking pretty difficult and annoying we decided to lease another parking spot in the parking lot for my girlfriend. Now the only marking of parking spots is a number painted on the pavement so naturally when it snows it’s a little hard to tell which spot is yours. So a few weeks ago she came home and parked in what she thought was her spot (next to the white car) and didn’t think anything of it. The next day we went out and saw Avatar and when we came back we didn’t even realize the car was gone. A few hours later when she was going out to meet some friends for dinner she called and told me that her car was not in the parking lot… great, it had gotten towed. Now by this point she couldn’t remember if she had pulled into the right spot or not as she got home at 3 am the night before and the spots were covered in snow. Ok, so no big deal, it was her fault she’ll eat the costs. So we head down to Lincoln Towing to pick up her car, which is nowhere near the building, it’s about 20-25 minutes south of us. So we get there and get the car, she goes off with her friends (since it just so happened the place they were going to eat was a block from Lincoln Towing) and I went home to clear out her spot so she knew where to park. So while the first incident was a little annoying and expensive ($170 or so) it was her mistake and she was in the wrong spot and deserved to get towed, so that’s not my complaint.
Flash forward to last night. It was my birthday so we went out to dinner with my family up in the suburbs. We left the apartment around 4:30 PM, had a quick dinner and were back home by 7:15pm. As we pull into the parking lot we notice that someone is now parked in my spot. I wasn’t too annoyed at this point because my spot is a very convenient one for people picking up or dropping people off so I figured I’d give them a few minutes in case that was the case and luckily the person who owns the spot next to me does not have a car and I was able to pull in and leave my car there for the time being. So we decided we would bring up some of the stuff that was in the car and then I’d come back down and see if the car had moved, if it hadn’t I would call for a tow truck.
So of course the car hadn’t moved when I came back down so I went back upstairs to get the tow truck number and password (apparently it’s so people can’t walk off the street and start having cars towed). So at about 7:45pm I called the tow truck, the only reason I waited that long is because I had to call the owner of the condo (since I rent) and get the password for the towing company since it wasn’t in any of the paperwork she had left me. So I call and give the towing company all the information and then hung around outside for a bit talking to another person from the building who was out walking their dog. About 20 minutes passed and there was no sign of a Lincoln Towing tow truck so I went back inside and just kept an eye out from my window so when it did come I could move my car back into my spot so I didn’t get towed.
At 9:00pm there was still no sign of a tow truck and the car was still parked in my spot so I called Lincoln Towing back and asked them how long it would be… “20 minutes” is what I was told. So around 9:30 there’s still no tow truck and I finally see the people walking out and get into their car, so I race down there to confront them about parking in my space. They had already gotten in their car and started to pull out, but the person they were visiting who lives in my building had walked them down so I confronted him and just let him know to tell his friends that they can’t park in the front. He said that they had told him they found a spot right in front, but he had assumed that they meant on the street… Whatever, if he assumed that he assumed that, but I informed him that they got really lucky that Lincoln Towing was late to come get them otherwise their car would have been towed.
So I call Lincoln Towing back and tell them that since they took their sweet ass time, not only did they not make any money on the deal, but I also didn’t get to sit down and watch 24 like I had planned. So thanks a lot Lincoln Towing for towing my girlfriends car the instant it was called in and then taking almost 2 hours to never even show up to tow a car out of my spot. I’m sure the association board is going to be thrilled to know that you guys are doing a great job…. ugh.
