I woke up Wednesday morning to discover my car was gone.
The night before, I parked it on Main Street in downtown Bangor. When I awoke, the road was closed to traffic and construction vehicles were preparing to pave the street.
I panicked. I’d seen no evidence that overnight parking was prohibited in that area when I parked shortly after 6 p.m. Tuesday.
There were no orange cones with “no parking” signs lining the street. I also hadn’t received any emails or text alerts from the city indicating that construction would begin early Wednesday morning and overnight parking downtown was prohibited.
As the Bangor Daily News’ city hall reporter, it’s my job to be aware of everything the city does. I check the city’s website and social media pages daily. I’m also registered to receive text alerts, emails and press releases with important information the city needs to communicate to residents.
I assumed that if there was a parking ban on multiple downtown streets starting overnight, I would know about it.
I was aware of one digital sign placed at the intersection of Harlow and Central streets on Tuesday, which said there was no parking on five different downtown streets, including Main Street, on Wednesday.
I assumed that meant overnight parking on Tuesday was fine, as I would be leaving early the next morning for work.
The only evidence of the paving work I’d seen was a Facebook post from the city, published last week, stating that various downtown streets would be paved the following week. However, the post did not include specific dates, times or any note that parking would be banned.
I thought the city would share more details about road closures and parking restrictions when those details were finalized.
On Wednesday afternoon, I had no choice but to pay $230 to release my car from the impound lot. To add insult to injury, there was a $20 parking ticket on my windshield.
I went to City Hall on Thursday to ask to be reimbursed for the impound fee and have my parking ticket voided.
After bringing my receipt from the towing company and the parking ticket to a city clerk, David Warren, the city’s spokesperson, came out to speak with me.
Warren apologized for the inconvenience of having my car towed and told me the city will reimburse the $230 impound fee, as “more could’ve been done” to tell residents parking wasn’t allowed that night.
He also gave me the contact information of someone in the Bangor Police Department to reach out to in order to have my parking ticket voided.
The department confirmed it voided my parking ticket Thursday afternoon.
However, Warren asked me to save my receipt from the towing company, as he wasn’t yet sure how the city would go about reimbursing people.
While I’m glad I’ll get the money back that I should not have had to pay in the first place, this issue feels far from resolved.