Snow Emergency Parking Rules

With all of the snow around here, I knew that I would have to get outside this morning and scrape my car. No problem! I got out to my car by 5:25, just a little earlier than usual. I went to get my scraper out of the car.

And the door was frozen shut. No problem! I'll just bang on the door around the lock a couple of times. But it was frozen pretty good. So I banged around the entire outside of my door to loosen it up. A couple minutes of banging seemed to do the trick. I turned on the car and got to scraping. I made it to my parking spot in downtown Minneapolis that I usually park. Up and down the street, I noticed there weren't as many cars as usual. As a matter of fact, every other car on the street had been plowed around. But wait a minute, weren't there rules for parking in the street during the winter? I seemed to remember hearing something to that effect. But I've never had to park on the street downtown after a snowfall. And the rules were probably completely different anyway.

I parked in my normal spot, behind another car but far enough up to park on the right side of a "No Parking" sign. No problem! Right below it was another sign that stated "Even side of the street". Excellent. Now for the three-quarter mile trek in the -2°F snow. I got to school with no major issues. But I did want to see if there were any parking rules I had to take into consideration.

I found this site, which confirmed that I was indeed parked on the wrong side of the street. No problem! I'll just walk back to my car and move it to the other side of the street. It was actually a bit warmer walking back to my car with the sun up, probably about 1°F. I got to my car just as the guy in charge of the adjacent parking lot was blowing snow from the sidewalk all over my car. I waited until he passed and tried opening the door.

Again, my door would not open. No problem! I'll just bang on the door again. It couldn't be as difficult as it was last time, since it had been open only an hour earlier. But the stupid door would not budge! I pulled on the handle, but I was almost afraid I was going to break it off. I must have been getting visibly frustrated, else the parking lot attendant wouldn't have walked over to me. Over the din of the snowblower, he offered to run inside and get the liquid you squirt into your key lock to get the car to open. Well I'll try anything once.

I took him up on his offer and he asked me to watch the snowblower. No problem! He ran inside and back out again. We walked over to the car, where I asked him how to use the stuff. He asked if I could get my key in the lock. It was at that point where I realized I had not unlocked the car. The parking attendant got the best laugh he had in days, and he told me as much.