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I am helping my oldest daughter move into a new apartment in Boston. I drove up with a carful of stuff, arrived at 10pm very tired, noted the "Back Bay Residence Permit" sign, decided to risk the ticket and move the car after the Verizon guy arrived at 9am to install fios. 10pm to 9am, not typically prime ticketing time.

I opened the door to the Verizon guy at 9am and where was my car?! On the tow truck, headed down the street.

Apparently, there are private tow companies that roam the streets and can take your car to their private lots. You have to wait a bit to make sure the car has been processed, figure out which private company has your car, figure out where their lot is, and go fetch it. This was all pretty difficult to figure out, because there is zero cell coverage in my daughter's basement apartment, the wifi didn't work, and my phone protested by glitching every time I went out in to the alley behind her building to try to catch a signal.

In the taxi on the way to the lot, I had my head down trying to chat with the Verizon bot (because the Verizon guy left assuring me that it would be working in 15-30 minutes and that was not true). When the taxi stopped, the driver said are you sure this is the place? I looked up and it was an industrial wasteland, drug addicts scattered around (I had never seen anyone shooting up in their shin before, that was new), with a shack that had the name of the tow company. I paid the fine and the lady in the shack said wait over there, the lot guy will come take you to your car. I waited, head down typing to the Verizon bot, and the lot guy came over and asked to see my form, which I handed to him. He started walking and I followed, and I kept following a long, long way. Then we started crossing a busy street and he said watch out, they think we are all drug addicts. We? I thought, and looked up at him more closely. He was: quite young, super skinny, long sleeves wool hat and long pants on a very warm day, bloodshot eyes, not many teeth. I thought: did I just blindly follow a drug addict through an industrial wasteland? We turned down a long deserted alley. Where is my car? I squeaked. He pointed to the end of the long deserted alley, and yes indeed, I did see my car. I started praying: please let me be safe, please do not let me treat them man as a criminal if he is doing legitimate work for the tow company, please let this be OK. And it was! I got my car and he turned around to take the long walk back to the shed. I did not offer him a ride, which I thought was defensible.

tldr do not park illegally in Boston unless you want a lil adventure.

So sorry that happened pippen! Hope the rest of your trip is safe and peaceful.

Yea, we learned early on after our daughter moved here (and we were still living in IL) that paying attention to signs and laws is taken very seriously here... especially deep in the city.

And just a head's up... avoid being in town around Sept. 1st. A HUGE number of apt leases in the area are up on Sept. 1st, which means a lot of renters have to be out of their apartments on 8/31, but can't get in their new apt until 9/1! People book movers out months in advance - movers who basically move someone's stuff out on 8/31, then drive the moving truck somewhere to park overnight, then drive their stuff to the new apt. on 9/1. Or if you're renting your own moving truck, you have to load it up on 8/31 (or a couple of days earlier if you have a place to land for a couple of nights), then move in on 9/1. And on 8/31-9/1, the narrow streets are lined with moving trucks and it's not uncommon for one moving truck, when they're done loading/unloading to get boxed in by other moving trucks, and have to wait until the other trucks move because cars are parked on either side of the street (if you're not moving and park on the street, be prepared to not be able to move your car those couple of days) and there's not enough room for cars to get by. It is an incredible clusterfuck.

Luckily when my D moved out of the city and into the suburbs this last time, it was because she sold her condo, so she wasn't beholden to the 9/1 vacate day... it was when she closed on the condo. The narrow, not-straight streets can be really intimidating, but I love living here (OK, I'm in the suburbs, too). With so many colleges/universities here, a lot of the moving calendar revolves around certain dates. I'm sorry you had to have that experience as your welcome to Boston!

number4 Thank you for the kind welcome to Boston - but I've had kids in college there for several years! I thought I knew the city a little better! Those roaming private tow trucks are probably not allowed to nab the cars of parents squeezing into a no parking area while dropping their kids off at university. Now that the oldest is out of dorm housing and on her own we are in real Boston, unprotected by the university bubble There's also a lot of moving out going on as we speak - I told my daughter not to buy too much furniture because she could probably meander by the housing areas of various campuses and outfit herself nicely for free. (She was not impressed with this idea).

Do you have favorite restaurants, events, etc? I hear the Goethe Institute has excellent board games. We now have three kids there so I am finding excuses to go up every month.

Shehawk, Thank you, I quite like my urban adventures, once I am safely on the other side of them.

I told my daughter not to buy too much furniture because she could probably meander by the housing areas of various campuses and outfit herself nicely for free. (She was not impressed with this idea)

lol

Google Allston Christmas - it's a real thing!! 😂
And a sort of rite of passage around here!

I googled Allston Christmas and that is hilarious! Thank you! I will head to Brookline on August 31 this year for a higher class of castoffs. Please send more Boston tips :) Do you think they ticket/tow if you park in a no-parking spot in the alleys behind the row houses in Back Bay ...? There is a place right behind my daughter's building that is probably marked no parking because it is short. I have a short car. Very tempting.