"Parking dibs" Top 5 Page for this destination Parking Tip by Dabs

If are you driving into Chicago and parking out in any of the neighborhoods in the snowy winter months, in addition to watching out for all the snowfall tow signs and resident sticker only parking signs, you also need to watch out for objects such as lawn chairs, milk crates, buckets or cones marking the parking spot for a local resident who shoveled out the spot for their car.

There's public debate about this practice every year after the first big snowfall but as it's a long standing tradition, some say endorsed by the Mayor, and it's not likely to go away anytime soon. It's technically illegal but then again so is ghost payrolling and dead people voting ;-)

So don't move those items littering the streets and try to park there, you may return to a nasty note if you are lucky, slashed tires or a broken window if you're not. One of the worst stories I've heard was about a poor clueless suburbanite who dared to move a cone, they returned to find their car buried in snow and buckets of water poured over their car. Needless to say, it was there for awhile.

But the worst is from the 2007 Darwin Awards:

"A man who shoveled snow for an hour to clear a space for his car during a blizzard in Chicago returned with his vehicle to find a woman had taken the space...understandably, he shot her."