Why is parking on my street such a nightmare?

I’m so freaking tired of all the construction around here. It’s been years since the first house down the street was sold and demolished after it’s owner, Vera, passed away quietly in the night. Since then, our lovely little street on this north side of Chicago has been bombarded by other home improvement projects sprouting up every couple days: another house demolished and sold to developers for rebuilding, 2 front porch re-do’s, a rebuilt garage, and some random backyard project two houses down that is just a series of random banging for months on end.

What does this have to do with parking?

Contractors. Trucks. Vans. Garbage bins the size of a house. Parking where us residents also time-share the public street. In and out, all day long. But always taking up that glorious spot right in front of my house. That’s MY spot.

This only exacerbates a crazy schedule of the City tree trimming department, Comed, and People’s gas randomly ripping up the entire street with sometimes a couple hours notice. And let’s not forget street cleaning that throws off parking for at least a month every month. Oh, and an ENORMOUS high school is right across the street…so we have tons of rando parking from students and teachers alike.

I realized the other day that I spend a significant amount of time every day thinking about parking: where’s my car? Where do I need to move my car? How close can I get? When do I have to move it farther? And this was the real kicker: My car is not where I parked it (apparently city crews are allowed to move your car to another spot, instead of towing to the impound, when you’re parked in a temporarily parked “tow zone” because the neighbors bush in their front yard is being trimmed today instead of the first sign’s indicator that it was 5 days ago.

I can’t say I’ve ever loved living in the city. I’ve tolerated it. But I dream about the day when parking is a foregone conclusion that I don’t have to spend any time on.

I dare not even imagine a world in which I can park my car in a garage. It’s too much.