Mine Road Lot FULL by 7:30????

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Originally posted by SlugBuddy
[br]Actually mycroft, you couldn't be more wrong. The Mine Road lot was built after a fiasco occurred at the old 610 lot and over 50 people were towed. Now do you think it was the early arrivers that were towed or the ones who came later who had no place to park? I was in on the meetings with the Stafford County Supervisors, VDOT, etc. and was there when the Mine Road Lot was conceived. The only problem with that at the time was that it was all the way on the other side of 610 and 610 is not a safe road to cross. Eventually the slug community came to a decision to make the old 610 lot the "early" lot and then once that was filled the later folks would go to the Mine Road lot and the drivers would in-turn know where to go at any given time. That process has been in effect for quite a while now and you can always refer back to previous posts on this message board if you want further proof. Nobody can make people stick to it but out of common courtesy to your fellow slugs (whether they are early or late) is to try to stick to the guidelines and be considerate of one another. Even admin placed an advisory on this site expressing what the system is.

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Groan.[V] You are so blinded by your desire to control the parking and slugging based on the time it's being done that you cannot see the facts that are so plainly obvious. Keep reading and I will point them out to you amidst a bunch of immensely opinionated statements.

1. The cars that were towed and/or ticketed were the ones that were parked illegally - regardless of what time they may have been parked that way. Claiming that the timing of the parking caused the problem obfuscates the causative fact that there were an insufficient number of parking spaces. Time is irrelevant - number of spaces is relevant.

2. The Mine Road lot was built to provide more LEGAL parking spaces rather than LATE parking spaces. If someone understood that the Mine Road lot would not be used for parking until the old lot was full, they were operating under a false assumption. If that were indeed the intent, there should have been some discussion about ensuring compliance, perhaps by the use of gates or signage. Absent any measures to ensure compliance, it is 100% predictable that there would be none. I know that there were discussions among van and car pools to move over to Mine Road simply as a matter of convenience and the timing was not even considered, so there were a whole bunch of parkers not party these discussions.

3. Making one lot "early" and one lot "late" WAS NOT THE SLUGGING COMMUNITY'S DECISION TO MAKE! People are going to park where it is most convenient for them, regardless of your attempt to park them where and when you want them to park. Appealing to Admin as an arbiter is pointless since Admin, like you , me, or dkerley, has no authority over anyone and their parking habits. We're just a bunch of commuters who deal with our own needs in a certain way and we have no influence over others who are not participating.

4. The non-slugging users of the Mine Road lot are under no obligation whatsoever to comply with your voluntary guidelines. Your appeal to their sense of consideration is arrogance of the highest order. Yeah, what you do is important, but what they do may be important too, and they are stakeholders in the lot every bit as much as you or I. You are asking people to play nice with you but you are being uncompromising and telling them they have no business doing what they do in order to get to work. Why should they comply?

5. The slugging users of the Mine Road lot are under no obligation whatsoever to comply, or even to read this website. This site is a tool (and a pretty darn good one) but it is not a court of law.

I really don't think that introducing more rigidity into the system will help you - you will simply never get the rest of the world to buy into your vision. I believe that the answer is more flexibility - then everybody can just park where there is a legal spot and have a chance of getting a ride directly from that lot rather than having to consult their watch and make an "early vs late" judgement call about where to look for a ride. I honestly believe that delimiting the slugging by time is as much of a mistake as the failed attempt to delimit slugging by destination. I think it will continue to be a problem just like Horner vs Potomac until everyone learns to take advantage of the flexible nature of the game rather than to keep attempting to contain it.

Anyway, for my part, I'll keep doing what I've always been doing, which is generally using the old lot early and Mine Road late but being flexible enough to take advantage of any situation that arises. In other words, if it's late and I'm driving and there is a line of cars in Mine Road but no parking spaces for slugs, I'm going to cruise over to the old lot and if I see available parking for slugs then I'm going to wait for slugs over there. You can remain true to your vision and sit in the line at Mine Road. Wanna bet who gets to work first?

Slug Buddy -- Some people love to hear themselves talk or type, rather. [:o)]

No, there aren't any time limits posted at either commuter lot, HOWEVER, as slugs and drivers who pick up slugs have developed a system in which everyone is able to park legally and get rides/pick up slugs.

The whole system was developed with the slug helping the driver get into the HOV and the slug getting a free ride to work. The whole system is based on people having consideration for one another.

This issue of who uses which lot falls under being considerate of your fellow slugs. I think its inconsiderate of someone to park in the Mine Road lot at 6:00 a.m. knowing full well that there are drivers picking up at the Staffordborough lot and that there are plenty of spaces to accommodate you. When someone that would typically park in the Staffordborough lot and they are one of the early birds, there before 7 a.m., you are causing the later slug that would normally park at Mine Road to 1) park illegally, 2)or walk across a busy intersection of traffic in which Stafford County has not provided crosswalks for.

I mean if you can't be considerate of each other perhaps you should find an alternative way to and from work.[:(!]

Dina

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Originally posted by dkerley


This issue of who uses which lot falls under being considerate of your fellow slugs. I think its inconsiderate of someone to park in the Mine Road lot at 6:00 a.m. knowing full well that there are drivers picking up at the Staffordborough lot and that there are plenty of spaces to accommodate you. When someone that would typically park in the Staffordborough lot and they are one of the early birds, there before 7 a.m., you are causing the later slug that would normally park at Mine Road to 1) park illegally, 2)or walk across a busy intersection of traffic in which Stafford County has not provided crosswalks for.

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dkerley: Don't forget that there are a lot of non-slugging commuters using the lot too. Don't assume they are aware of the difficulty it may cause you at 8:00 when their van pool meets there at 5:45. It's likely, too, that they aren't reading this website so you may not be reaching them. You may be able to reach the slugs and they might voluntarily comply (as I do myself) but that still might not be enough of a swing to solve the problem.

That might be a good alternative -- the shopping centers at Potomac Mills allows commuters to park in a portion of their parking lot -- I wonder if you to ask someone just to be sure and if so, who? I certainly wouldn't want to encourage anyone to park over there if there is the possibility of getting towed or a ticket.

SlugBuddy, I honestly don't think that we are running out of space I think the early birds that were parking in the old Staffordborough lot decided to park in the Mine Road lot. There are spaces over at the Staffordborough lot from what I understand, after 7:30. The bad thing is that all the drivers in search of slugs are at the Mine Road lot.

So do you have a real first name you care to share with me? I can't tell who you are by the screen name (that's the whole point right?). I am just curious as you have ridden with Shawn and I on several occasions. [;)]

Dina

Dixiedog, why do you bother?[:(!]

Dina