The city of Detroit is in the process of trying to rejuvenate its image. Under the leadership of Mayor Mike Duggan, some progress is being made. Now, however, the cleanup effort has set its sights on broken and abandoned vehicles across the city.
As covered by the Detroit Free Press, the crackdown kicked off in earnest earlier this year. In April, Mayor Duggan used the State of the City address to announce a new initiative targeting the blight of unsightly damaged vehicles cluttering up city neighborhoods.
When the city moves in to clear burnt-out husks and trashed vehicles, it’s usually a good thing. But the city’s crack teams are going further than you might think. The wide-open policy is snaring plenty of vehicles under a broad definition of “abandoned,” and that’s catching many residents off guard at the expense of their vehicles.
The Crackdown
This year, officers of Detroit’s Municipal Parking Department have been tasked with hunting abandoned vehicles, working in concert with Detroit Police. Vehicles can be considered “abandoned” if they have been on a city street without moving for more than 48 hours.
If you think you’re car is safe because it’s parked at home, think again. “Inoperable” vehicles on private property are liable to enforcement, too. Much of Duggan’s State of the City address called out commercial vehicles being improperly stored or dumped in residential areas, but merely broken cars are also targets, even when they’re on the owner’s property. The city simply doesn’t want to see residential yards with vehicles up on bricks in varying states of disrepair.
[Mercedes’ Note: It’s worth noting that “commercial vehicles” here doesn’t just mean tractor-trailers and box trucks. The city seems to consider any sort of business vehicle a “commercial vehicle.” So if you’re a plumber or a contractor with your business emblazoned on your vehicle, you can’t park it at home. Has Detroit become America’s largest HOA? -MS]
City officers will tag vehicles with a sticker indicating they’ve been deemed abandoned. Owners are then expected to move the vehicle to essentially prove that’s not the case. Nominally, the time frame is 24 to 48 hours, but extensions can be granted by calling a city number listed on the ticket. Tagged cars are entered into the city’s tracking system and then given a hearing date within a few weeks. If the vehicle is found in violation, a Certificate of Compliance is posted on the vehicle requiring the owner to move it within 24 hours. After that, the vehicle can be towed.
Once towed, the car can sit for up to seven days before the matter is handed to the state of Michigan. The state will then contact the most recent registered owner. If no response is forthcoming, the vehicle can be auctioned by the city or sent to scrap. Beyond the loss of the vehicle, failing to remove an inoperable vehicle can lead to fines which start at $100.
It can seem altogether too easy to fall victim to the measures. After all, a great many people will park on the street for a few days at a time without using their vehicle, particularly when out of town. And what car enthusiast hasn’t had a beleaguered project sitting on their lawn for a week or more as a result of a wrenching adventure gone wrong? Johnny Thomas, Detroit’s director of code enforcement, assured wrenchers that most vehicle owners wouldn’t have to worry, as the city typically only receives complaints about obviously abandoned vehicles that have sat for weeks or more.
Reality On The Ground
The Detroit Free Press went on a ride-along with city enforcers, with eye-opening results. City code enforcement specialist Benta Dixon was on patrol, ticketing vehicles on jackstands or with expired license plates. Expired registration was enough to deem a vehicle “inoperable” in the city’s eyes. Dixon spotted two vehicles without tires on the property of one Debbie Collins, a 69-year-old local of some ten years. The vehicles were ticketed, with Dixon explaining several options to Collins. “I’ll try to get a scrap person to come and get the cars before the city has to come and get it,” Collins told the outlet. “She was like, if you can get somebody to come in and get them, you can try to earn something from it as well.”
Some residents were surprised to hear they weren’t allowed to park inoperable vehicles on their own property without getting in trouble with the city. As per the report:
“You’re only allowed one inoperable vehicle at your property, all the tires have to be inflated and it has to be under some type of shed or tarp,” Dixon told Tyler, who asked Dixon, “So we can’t park in our own backyard?”
Dixon gently responded, “as long as it’s on pavement, yes. On grass, no.” Tyler, who has lived in her home as a renter for 21 years, said she parks in the back to avoid vehicle damage from speeding drivers, who have previously hit her daughter’s car.
Tyler noted that parking the vehicles in her backyard was intentional and an effort to avoid theft. “I mean, it’s not like we are rich people. You know what I’m saying? We are in a poor neighborhood and we are doing the best we can to survive,” she told the Detroit Free Press. Fellow resident Nakeisha Thompson similarly complained that residents should be able to park on their property as they see fit. “Where are all the cars gonna go? They’re gonna have to come on the street?” Thompson told the outlet.
A policy to remove “abandoned vehicles” is typically welcomed by residents. If vehicles are being illegally dumped on private or state property, that’s a problem. Those vehicles should be removed. But lumping in residdent’s own cars on the lawns of their own houses? That’s going a long way to interfere with people’s personal property.
Our own David Tracy famously owned quite the fleet back in his Detroit days. Many of those vehicles lived on the lawn in varying states of repair. They too came to grief with city authorities in much the same way, and from what we heard, dealing with the fallout wasn’t easy.
Ultimately, it puts owners of “inoperable” vehicles in a tough spot. If you get a flat tire in Detroit, you better swap it fast or get your car on a driveway. Leave it street-parked in that state, and you could quickly get into trouble. Similarly, if your car won’t start, you might not want to attempt a fix at home on the front lawn, lest a city inspector pass by while the car’s in pieces. If you don’t have a garage or off-street parking, it makes everything harder.
The city claims it isn’t trying to be outright adversarial. Much of the effort is going towards dealing with long-term abandoned vehicles. Trucks, trailers, and dead cars dumped on verges and on the back lots of abandoned homes? All of those need to be dealt with.
The problem is that it’s all too easy for the humble car enthusiast to get caught up in the crossfire. If you’re in Detroit with a few broken project cars in your backyard, the party’s over. Start figuring out what you’re going to do before the city comes knocking on your door.
All images credit: City of Detroit State of the City Address
Detroit has been bulldozing entire blocks of abandoned homes.
Picking up cars seems very minor in comparison.
Ask David who’s tougher Troy or Detroit?
maybe its because I own property maybe its because Im getting older, but put your project vehicles under a tarp. I moved into my current property. My Neighbor has two dead craftsman lawnmowers sitting outside. It is an eyesore but I cant do anything about it.
On one hand, I’m fully in support of legislation that cracks down on unmaintained vehicles.
Regardless of your location and economic situation, driving a privately-owned automobile on a public road is a privilege not a right. That comes with responsibilities to your fellow road users, like following driving laws, and maintaining your vehicle’s critical safety systems. If you can’t afford (or be bothered…) to keep your vehicle(s) operational with air in the tires, maybe car ownership (or project vehicles as a hobby) isn’t for you.
Idk how I feel about not being able to store vehicles in your backyard on grass- but with residential zoning, you need to draw the line somewhere. You can’t have a junkyard of vehicles rusting and dripping oil into the ground in a community area. This law seems to allow for at least one long term project vehicle stored under a tarp on pavement- Which seems plenty, unless you’re a hoarder.
Counterpoint:
This legislation only works if your law abiding citizens have a viable alternative to get around. Given Detroit’s sprawl and harsh winter weather, this means a *safe and reliable* mass transit system. Without that in place, this law basically just punishes the poor.
You can’t underfund your public infrastructure and act surprised when your working class are relying on junkers to get to work.
How did they get to work in the days before public transit and cars if they were too poor to afford a horse?
work from home on the homestead? walk uphill in the snow both ways?
Probably live in a rooming house down the street from the factory, or work on the farm and never leave.
Ultimately the city of Detroit was bankrupt a decade ago. You can’t run a modern city (even a failing one) without workers, and with no money for infrastructure, mobility for the lowest-earning commuters has clearly been shitbox-dependent.
Real talk, the legislation mentioned in this article is basically normal for most urban areas, the real story is that it took Detroit this long.
“You can’t run a modern city (even a failing one) without workers”
Yet. Bring on the robots!
There were villages within walking distance to the Manor House.
There were rooms in the attics for servants.
There were rows of shacks on the plantation for the workers.
There were “company towns” and “company stores” outside the factory gates – your rent and shopping bill were deducted from your pay packet.
Basically – You lived where you worked.
And now we have work from home, mixed use communities, etc.
For those who are fortunate enough, yes.
Otherwise its suburban (or rural) sprawl where you need to drive 5 miles to change your mind.
So if you get a flat tire from one of Detroit’s infamous potholes and you drive a car with an uncommon tire size that has to be special ordered then you’re going to have a bad week.
Probably should fit the spare tire while you wait for your order to arrive.
A lot of cars don’t come with spares these days, especially sports cars with hard to find wide rear tires.
Pretty sure that Caprice and Aerostar are on fairly common wheel sizes.
It’s most likely that the cars they see with a flat tire already has all mismatched tires on it. I doubt any one of them would be waiting for the odd-sized tire for their Ferrari.
Metro Detroit suburbs have very similar regulations about cars that need to have registration up to date, doesn’t look abandoned, you cannot park on the grass or have RVs sitting in your house the whole year. Unless you have a big property above certain acreage, these are basic city ordinances.
I havent read anything about how many cars you can have in your property but having 10 in a suburb, I am surprised no one said nothing. 3 in the garage, 4 in the driveway that fit pretty well and 3 on the street, not a single one in front of other neighbors houses. Fingers crossed lol
I can see both sides of this issue. Almost all of the cars towed are probably justified, but the ones that aren’t leave a citizen screwed over with their life turned upside down.
Part of the problem is inner-city car ownership. Historically, people who lived in big cities didn’t own cars, but that’s all changed. Without a garage or proper driveway, there’s just not enough room.
A possible solution for Detroit could be to utilize all of those vacant lots. Build city-owned parking facilities on them so that the streets can remain clear.
If you actually own a car in usable, driving and registered condition it’s pretty easy to avoid this enforcement.
True, and as someone who lives in a place that would never tolerate a dead car for more than 5 seconds, I agree that municipalities should police this.
But there’s also the “oppression of the system” that affects many Americans. Fixing a basket-case problem like a timing chain or blown transmission can bankrupt a minimum-wage worker. Registering a car can get very complicated when it can’t pass emissions or safety inspections.
It would be nice if everyone could go about their lives without having to worry about this stuff, but that’s not the world our ancestors have left for us.
If they have the skills to do it themselves, either of those problems are can be addressed for not that much money.
If they lack the skills to fix it, and lack the money to pay someone else to fix it then the car is never going to work as a car for them anyway. Whether it’s rotting on their lawn or crushed at a scrap yard it’s the same amount of useful.
Considering that, I’d say removing an inoperable vehicle that will never again be operable doesn’t even represent a financial loss to the owner. At that point you’re just picking up the garbage from the curb. If you hit them with a fine then that’s messed up. I hope the fines are reserved for the large offenders.
True, there are cars that are obviously too far gone, but there are others that just need a few repairs. The hard part is telling the difference.
This is MI. There are no safety inspections. People literally drive around with the bottom 6″ of steel missing from their doors.
By the time a car in MI has been abandoned, it is truly used up. Nobody’s showing up with a pair of pliers and a new battery and driving these away.
Anyone else feel like they started writing this law specifically to target DT?
Is this why he skedaddled off to the West Coast?
100%! He needed a new place to stash his non running Jeeps.
Santa Monica doesn’t put up with that mess at all
I bet, but he’s got most of them parked on the Galpin compound.
Galpin is in The Valley.
You can get away with more out there generally
Lol of course Duggan would pull some crap like this instead of meaningfully improving the city. Just continuing the history of racism and classism that killed this city in the latter half of last century. It’s not a revival, it’s Zombie Detroit.
Land Of The Free, Home Of What The Actual Fuck.
Freedom!
You can’t go away for a weekend if a car you leave behind has a flat tyre.
This is so infuriating. And here I was thinking the USA was all about the sanctity of private property. Turns out that may apply only to store fronts during civil rights protests.
From an outsider’s perspective, it’s become nearly impossible to look at American politics and not think it’s a system designed to oppress individual citizens by default – unless there is an economic interest “protecting” specific citizen’s rights. Total bullshit.
You’re right, but there is also a need to prevent citizens from oppressing each other. It can be argued that the people who leave junk cars around the neighborhood are, in fact, oppressing their neighbors.
So if I’ve got a flat tyre for a couple of days I’m oppressing everyone else?
If you leave a car with no engine and no tires sitting on concrete blocks in front of my home, you would definitely be reducing my use and enjoyment of my home.
I think we have a poor perspective on this because we are car people and believe to some extent that all cars have value. In these cases, these are no longer cars – they’re just garbage. If these were overflowing dumpsters covering lawns and roadways we’d have no problem with the cleanup.
A couple of days, no. A couple of weeks, yes.
It seems that Detroit is pulling the trigger 12 days earlier than seems reasonable.
Around the neighborhood perhaps. And as someone who has hoarding neighbors who do just that I approve, street parking is enough of a pain without 5-6 projects in the way.
Parked on your own property off pavement though? That’s going a bit far.
“Off pavement on your property” means different things. On a one-acre-plus property, it’s not very notable because it’s not very visible.
The truth is, if you want to live in close proximity to other people, you have to follow those people’s rules. If you want to let your freak flag fly without any regard for others, then you need to find a place to live that has the space to do so harmlessly.
In this case it means that very literally. It’s on land you pay for but not on concrete or asphalt. As far as harm goes you’re not denying anyone access to public space. There may be an argument for environmental reasons but in these cases that ship sailed long ago. Plus it’s not like Detroit isn’t already contaminated from a century of industrialization and neglect.
“If you want to live in close proximity to other people, you have to follow those people’s rules” is a two way street. I am part of those who make the rules. As such I reserve the right to give no fucks whatsoever about your selfish property values, especially if they work against my financial interests as a renter. I may put in an effort to maintain basic hygiene but unless you can prove a clear and present physical or public health danger you can mind your own business about what happens on land I pay for.
They’re towing cars from private property. That’s my issue with this. I have zero issues with cars in disrepair being removed from the street. I personally don’t have a huge problem with abandoned cars – much less my neighbour’s cars in disrepair, but I understand the social contrct around it – I’ve excuseed myself profusely any chance I got when I had to park my car in the neighbourhood with a banged up front for 4-5 months because I couldn’t afford to fix it right away. Everyone kept telling me it was fine, but I still felt bad about it, even if similar situations have occurred the other way around and it did not bother me one bit. A couple of days ago my neighbour finally towed away his broken VW Lupo that had sat in the closest parking space to my door since last year.
My qualm with this is simple: going into your property and towing a non-functional vehicle is messed up. And oppressive neihgbours will have a lot of fun messing up other people’s lives just because – see Mercedes’ example.
These are not new or uncommon rules. The city just hasn’t had the money or will to enforce them in years (decades?), which has left the city littered with abandoned vehicles.
My issue is solely with them towing vehicles from private property. Street parked abandoned/semi-abandoned cars are fair game. If the laws that allow for authorities to trespass on your property to tow away a junky car are old, that just makes it worse.
There are many laws regarding what you can do with your private property, especially if you choose to live within city limits. It can be annoying, and some rules go too far. We all have different opinions on what is “too far.” But for citizen health, hygiene, and the environment, it’s necessary.
Also I don’t know how much time you spend in Detroit, but blight clean up is necessary. These vehicles are leaking fluids, are a source of broken glass on roads, and hosue vermin.
I definitely do not go to Detroit often – or at all. I do live in a city that used to have an impressive number of abandoned street-parked cars (I used to see three from my studio window), and I get that they’re annoying for multiple reasons. But unless we’re talking of literal unlicensed junkyards, I take issue with the environmental argument here as an excuse to tow cars from private property, because somehow legislators are always pushing for punishment and conditioning of private citizens re: the environment while actively giving a pass to the biggest polluters out there – often legislating according to the pollutants’ interests after being “lobbied” to do so.
We joke about how David’s former house in Michigan became a condemend site because of all the various fluids that must’ve seeped into the soil over the years, but I believe that’s just a hyperbole. Was David polluting his backyard back then? Sure, mildly. Would it make a big difference from an environmental standpoint if all Davids in the world were forced to surrender their rustmobiles? I don’t think it’s possble that all Davids put together can have anywhere near as much of a negative impact as, say, churning out new cars at an ever-growing pace, for instance. Meanwhile, here we are discussing how the Davids of the world may or may not be bad for the environment while the entire economic/political system actively encourages the pursuit of eternal growth – in a planet with finite resources and already facing the effects of climate change for decades, no less.
> it’s become nearly impossible to look at American politics and not think it’s a system designed to oppress individual citizens by default
That wasn’t the original design, but it absolutely works that way.
To be fair, I’m referring more to lawmaking over time, not the framework provided by the constitution.
Or go away for a week while a tire has a slow leak, or someone slashes a tire while you’re gone.
Even if it was full before you left.
So… not to get too pedantic here, but words have meaning. “Government” doing things is what we would call democracy (in this instance, at least), as what the government is doing presumably represents the will of the majority of the people who voted for it. You could even run with the label of “authoritarianism,” (and yes, democratic authoritarianism is a thing) should you wish, as this represents somewhat the antithesis of libertarianism (freedom to use one’s property as one wishes).
But capitalism – whose fundamental and foundational definition is “voluntary exchange of goods and services” – it assuredly is not. It is, to be clear, the government engaging in this activity, for which no citizen on any side of this equation is presumably “voluntarily” doing anything. So while there might be cronyism involved for the tow yards here, what’s occurring is still in service to the state.
And, to address the whole “criminalize the poor” thing – who do you think is going to be reporting people’s problem vehicles? It’ll be their likely-in-similar-economic-status neighbors. If you’re somebody who takes care of your house, makes sure your lawn is free of garbage, your windows are cleaned, and that your cars are parked on the pavement, you probably (no offense intended towards DT here) don’t want your neighbors hasn’t-run-in-four-years jalopy rotting on the street next to yours.
I tend to veer towards libertarianism (small l) and thus have mixed feelings about this (particularly the 48-hour time allotment), but I don’t think I would really care too much if they widen the window to two weeks or a month and stay out of people’s backyards.
“…who do you think is going to be reporting people’s problem vehicles? It’ll be their likely-in-similar-economic-status neighbors.”
That doesn’t mean they have good intentions whatsoever.
My neighbor hates me for being trans and visibly lesbian. She reports my cars to the condo management company on a regular basis hoping to have them towed. Once she even reported two of my Smarts as stolen…Yes, two cars titled and registered in my name. She was hoping maybe I did steal them or something?
She was successful only once, and that was back in 2020. My cars weren’t breaking any rule or law, but they were illegally towed at her demand.
I sued the management company and rightfully destroyed them in court. I then destroyed the tow company, too, and have a nice judgement that’s gaining interest for another 5 years.
The management company doesn’t dare mess with me anymore. The infuriating part? This lady parks in a handicap spot every single day. No plates or placard, yet she never gets fined or towed…
This situation in Detroit is even worse. Have a neighbor who hates you? Now they can just snitch on you to the city and get their jollies while you suffer.
Jesus Christ, that is one absolutely messed up story. Good to hear you were eventually vindicated and made whole (or at least as whole as possible), even if it really, really sucks that you had to go through all of that. At least there’s some positive stuff that came out of it, in terms of the judgment.
No disagreement from me on that point. Like any law, it can be weaponized by those – be it the reporting party, police officers, prosecutors, or municipal code enforcement – who wish to do so. That’s not unique to this particular law, and is a regrettable-but-necessary feature of any ostensible quality-of-life law (including curfew laws, noise ordinances, and a host of others).
But my original point was more directed at the consideration that this was criminalizing poverty. Which it really isn’t. Like, like it or not, most people – including those whose intentions are not particularly nefarious – want their neighbors to care for their property. Whether you subscribe to broken window theory or not, at some point the viewscape becomes a common good, and needs to be addressed. Where that point is / line gets drawn is going to be a little different for everybody.
To argue that this is a law targeting the poor – when it’s a product of a democratic process that everybody in Detroit can participate in – is a little disingenuous. And this isn’t just a “car people vs. everyone else” thing either – the ordinance permits an inoperable vehicle per residence, so really this is only going after vehicles that are truly abandoned or whose owners are veering into hoarding status. This particular law has been on the books since October of 2000, and for the past several years Detroit has been towing somewhere between 9,000 and 14,000 vehicles per year that were deemed inoperable. Most cities have similar have-to-move-it laws on their books, so Detroit is not unique in this regard.
What happened to you with your neighbor maliciously reporting vehicles as stolen should not have happened, and I’m glad you were able to gain some measure of recompense from those who acted maliciously.
> for the past several years Detroit has been towing somewhere between 9,000 and 14,000 vehicles per year that were deemed inoperable
Most of those were Jeeps titled to one “D. Tracy.”
Have you called the police? If they were so hot to trot to tow your vehicles, I’d think they’d be happy to earn a little easy fine money from her.
The police didn’t tow me, but the tow company hired by building management. I live in the condo version of an HOA, woohoo.
Sadly, the last time I reported her to the police, I was told “we don’t enforce on private property.” I then reported her to building management and nothing happened. There’s a new tow company working the complex (since I destroyed the last one) and they won’t do anything without authorization from the board. Which, hey, that’s great!
I’m pretty sure my neighbor knows that nobody actually enforces the fine posted on the handicap signs, so it’s just an honor system… and she clearly has no honor. lol
Wonderful…
Who here if their wheels were stolen would be able to get a new set with the tires you want in 48 hours?
This sounds more like a cash grab than ‘cleaning up the image of Detroit’, Maybe if you actually dealt with the criminals responsible for cars on blocks you wouldn’t have so many of the damn things.
This is like going after people who had their catalytic converters stolen for not meeting emissions…. Which some places are doing so.
If I needed that car to get to work, I’d find some solution in less than 48 hours. It would probably be whatever junkyard wheels would fit, and I’d use those until I find the right wheels and tires.
Sometimes my tires arrive from Tirerack the day after I order them, so that’s also a viable option.
When I needed new wheels for my obscure Lotus I had to get some custom machined. It took a week to get them delivered which I was quite impressed by.
I guess the upside is that there are only 102 people in the country that would steal my wheels.
I’m betting you don’t park your Lotus on the street or your front lawn.
I did street park it for four hour last night while I was out. Normally it’s parked half on/half off my property.
My wheels were stolen in Detroit in a private parking lot, car on bricks. I had to tow the car ASAP before someone arrived to start stealing parts or something worse happened. They damage a lot of parts under the vehicle that insurance totaled it (Chevy Volt).
:'(
Monsters, the lot of them.
Cash grab? You really think the city can make a profit on that garbage?
The program will probably cost more to implement than they will get.
I think 48 hours is way too short of a time period. But these programs are a part of what is necessary to clean up blight in cities.
This a million times this – if you cannot have a nice car in the city because it will get stolen and stripped for parts (yes, no Hellcat ownership in Detroit – your car will get stolen); maybe you should crack down on the grand theft auto and then maybe people will not need to park their cars in their backyard. My guess is the big bust back in May has not solved this problem.
hehehe I came for the comments on David Tracy, left satisfied 😛
When you’re better off moving your cars from Detroit to California, you know Detroit is doing something wrong.
Yeah being ghetto isn’t good the for the city’s reputation, but is turning the city into one big HOA any better?
Never mind the fact that a car in California will easily last hundreds of years before rust starts to become noticeable. How does that compare with Detroit?
Looks like David dodged a bullet on this one.
Or should I say a dozen?
Did they take care of the random ones left with plates off where they last broke down? When I went to school there, a K-van sat cockeyed and nearly blocking a highway entrance ramp where it stopped after one of the front wheels broke off. It sat there for months. No shortage of others, but they weren’t blocking roads.
Imagine going away for a week of vacation. You have a project in your driveway and a bunch of junk in your garage. You usually park your daily on the street, but since you’ll be gone for a week, you parked it in your yard instead.
Then you get home from vacation, nice and refreshed, and some jackhole broke into your property and stole your car from your front yard!
Park both cars latitudinally across the driveway. They’d be on pavement.
Dig out a giant rectangular space in the back of your yard, fill it with tamped dirt and gravel, or cement, or large, thick paver stones. If the city of Detroit is only specifying that you “can’t park on your grass, even in your own backyard”, then boom. There’s your pavement.
That sounds like so much work. I would not do that to save any of the cars pictured above.
On one hand, what you said is very true and logical. Oh the other hand, never underestimate what amount of effort people would go through just for spite.
I could totally see someone in Detroit making a paved area in their backyard just to fit with the arbitrary rule of “It can’t be parked on grass”.
They’d just run into zoning enforcement. I assume they have rules regarding lot coverage.
It may be better just to spitefully repair, insure and register the vehicle.
Save time and materials, just put ‘pavement’ (tarmac/gravel/concrete etc) down in two strips, wide enough to fit the wheels. Or push it even further, just get four paving slabs and position them under each wheel.
Someone tell Mayor Duggan that David Tracy already moved to California.
Being from Detroit, I have a feeling that this is not going to end well.
Does anything ever end well in Detroit?
Hmm. Let me think.
I determined never to live or visit Detroit after seeing “Robocop.” That’s based on a true story, right?
I was a fan of the spin-off documentary: 6000 SUX: The Rise and Fall of a Big American Tradition
I’d buy that for a dollar.
This seems unnecessarily militant, and I say that as someone who has had as many as four (formerly-)high-end, broken vehicles on his property.
Are there any.. 2nd Amendment enthusiasts living in Detroit with at least one project or broken car parked in their backyard?
If the answer is ‘yes’, then I’m sure there won’t be any kind of gun-related incidents when someone will come to tow them away, right?..
> at least one project or broken car parked in their backyard
They would need two or more for this to apply.
The effects of David posting all over the Internet about his fleet finally rippled through City Hall and back out to the community.
My state allows one unregistered/broken vehicle on your property. If you hide it in a garage they tend not to care as it is cannot be seen from the street.
I think some people would be happy with the “no more projects until you finish your beater” rule.
But some enthusiasts love to collect a few…
Sir, this is America, not some communist.. <checks notes> Australia..? 😀
But seriously, this is what HOA power trip wet dreams are made of
I lived in a city like this, no unregistered or inoperable vehicles parked outdoors, even on private property, all motor vehicles parked on placement only, any trailers or boats had to be in the back yard and completely screened from view from the street and all neighboring properties.
One time, my employer let the registration lapse on my company car, and it took them months to sort it out, so it had to sit my my garage taking up space, while they rented another vehicle for me to use, so I now had to juggle 4 vehicles with barely enough space to park 2 or 3 and couldn’t use the garage for anything else
It was one of several reasons I moved out into an unincorporated area in the country, nobody cares about that here.
Well, the crime was the other big reason.
That sounds incredibly frustrating.
I’m fighting with a tough parking situation right now and I’m sweating with one of my cars on the street.
The real annoying thing was, I had two legitimately abandoned vehicles dumped in front of that house in the five years I lived there, and the city was horrible at dealing with those, but I just knew they’d jump right on slapping a ticket on that white fleet special Escape sitting in the driveway, because it obviously wasn’t abandoned and therefore had an owner that would actually pay up.
One was a wrecked ’90s Malibu, rear bashed in real bad, that turned up at the curb in front of my side yard with two flat tires and no license plate. Sat for weeks until the city came around and stuck an “Abandoned Vehicle” decal on it. Then it sat like that for several months – literally, about 4 months, before it was towed away.
Another was a really ratty looking 1970s motorhome with an expired Californian registration that turned up parked at the curb in the spring of 2020. Steps were down and the windshield had curtains drawn, but I never saw any lights and never saw or heard anyone in or near it, though I assume someone was living in there. That one stayed for a good 2 months, then just moved, either towed or under its own power, to another street around the corner, where it continued to sit. Even though the city limited non-resident motorhome parking to no more than 7 days on a public street (us residents were only allowed a max of 48 hours on street).
Shit like that made me realize that I’d rather have the cheapest, crappiest house in an affluent neighborhood than the absolute nicest house in a marginal one.
Spring of 2020….hmmm.
I wonder if there might have been some mitigating circumstances…
My Dad’s spot was the only place to wrench for many years and it was a constant game with the city. Moving cars around, keeping them plated, parking on concrete and covering if they had to sit for a while. Repairs had to be done quick as the inspector kept coming by with the “dismantling vehicles” ordinance bs.
The thieves didn’t make it any easier. License plates, car covers, and car parts kept disappearing. Used one way screws for the plates but they just cut the part off with the registration sticker. Cover was chained to the car but that doesn’t stop bolt cutters. Any unsupervised parts and tools disappeared fast. Once I went into the garage for 5 minutes only to come back to three guys inside the car attacking the dash with a screwdriver. Another time I was replacing a heater core and some random dude walked right up next to me and started picking parts up. Asked him what the hell he was doing and he said: ” I can have.”
Keep telling my Pops to move out with me to the boondocks but he’s stubborn. Recently his car got hit and knocked the bumper off. He put the plate on the dashboard visible through the windshield. Nope, $75 parking ticket for no front plate.
I think I would have moved the company car to the company parking lot while they figured it out.
There wasn’t one, I was one of 3 employees in the state, my boss worked out of his house and lived two states over
Well, I guess there was the headquarters in North Carolina, but that would have just been an even bigger hassle
That was part of the problem, there had been a regional office in Maryland, they registered company vehicles to that address, then they broke the lease, replaced the warehouse with a couple storage units and replaced the office part by having managers work out of their houses. All the cars had to be re-registered to employees’ home addresses, but under the company name, and the fleet management company completely botched it
David got away in the nick of time.
I literally posted this to him straight away, and he was like, damn
David was out in Troy, where the fancy mall is.
I got away with murder, make no mistake about it.
Here’s hoping the Oakland County cadaver dog corps never goes sniffing around your old homestead, then.