Clerk's Website Helping City Drivers Navigate Residential Parking Zones

CHICAGO (CBS) -- If you've ever been confused by Chicago's residential parking system, or gotten a ticket when you parked on a zoned street, City Clerk Susana Mendoza hopes you'll appreciate a new addition to her website.

Chicago has more than 1,400 residential parking zones.

"Yes, you heard that right. There are 1,429 residential parking zones in the city of Chicago," Mendoza said. "We added one more while we were talking."

Mendoza said there hasn't been any good way to keep track of which streets were off-limits to drivers without zone permits.

There was a book, but Mendoza said "The only copies of this book were found at the very front counters of the office of the city clerk. So not super-convenient for people to get to."

The book also was dated almost as soon as it was printed.

A new feature on Mendoza's website allows people to call up a map of residential permit zones, and zoom in and find out, street by street, where they can park.

The city clerk's office announced the zoned parking website at an appearance with private website developers, who touted their own sites, aimed at helping drivers and renters, with information collected from the city of Chicago.

Those sites are:
RentConfident.com
ParkNav.com
BeatTheMeters.com

In:
• Steve Miller