I’ve made several drives to St. Paul in the past few weeks. (Memo to self: file mileage expenses while company is still solvent.) One trip was to attend a news conference given by emergency-room nurses for a story about traffic safety. Another was for this story about the Central Corridor light-rail line’s potential impact on two downtown churches — a Catholic one and a Presbyterian one, above — and on Minnesota Public Radio’s headquarters.

I parked at a meter when I visited the churches. As I dropped all my remaining quarters in, I regretted having used coins a few days before in Minneapolis, when I could have used my parking-meter card instead. (The card is good in both cities, but only if you put money on it in both cities, something I haven’t done.) I decided to gamble that my interviews would last an hour and forty minutes.

Alas.

I overstayed by 20 minutes, and the ticket was issued 13 minutes after the meter expired. I did decide that the green stripe on the envelope was more soothing than the red ones I’ve seen — maybe that’s why I wasn’t terribly upset.

Parking tickets are a rare occurrence in my life — this was maybe my fourth one — so I was new to the idea that the fine could be paid online. The web address printed on the back of the violation slip (www.ramsey.courts.state.mn.us) turned out to be out of date, but I was able to click through to www.mncourts.gov/district/2/ and find my way to the “pay fines online” page. It probably took a few minutes longer than just writing a check, but it saved paper and postage, and there was no extra fee for using a credit card.

The fine was $25, which didn’t seem too bad, since I know Minneapolitans who have had to pay $34 for similar violations. It’s a little annoying to kiss any amount of cash goodbye during a global financial crisis, but unlike the money that’s vanished from my 401(k), at least these dollars will recirculate in our local economy.

That’s what I’m telling myself, anyway.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 3rd, 2008 at 6:06 am and is filed under Main. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.