La Crosse finally gets pay to park rules right

It took three years, but the city of La Crosse may finally have gotten it right. The city began charging to park in its municipal ramps three years ago, and ever since the effort has been marred by delays, frustration and confusion. City hall took forever to come up with a plan for how to implement the new parking rules, but still got it wrong. The system they chose led to some drivers unable to get out of the ramps, and dozens of broken parking gates. Finally the city is ready to scrap that system in favor of a gateless system. At least there will be no more gates for vandals to destroy. The new system, now being installed in the city’s municipal ramps, is called a free-flow system. It will use license plate readers and remote pay stations. The city will also utilize new technology which will allow people to pay to park using a smartphone app. That is progress. But this is the second pay to park system the city has bought in three years. And they don’t come cheap. Clearly the old system was a waste of our tax dollars. Maybe they can sell the old system to some other unsuspecting city. It is good that La Crosse is finally figuring out how to properly charge people to park, but it certainly shouldn’t have taken this much time, or this much money.