How "The City That Knows How" treats visitors

From the SF Chronicle's Letters to the Editor, July 9, 2010:

Parking "gotcha" in S.F.

On Monday, Independence Day, I came into the city to have lunch with a friend. It being a city, county and federal holiday, I didn't put money in the meter. But when I came out, I had received a parking meter citation, as had everyone on the block.

Researching this online, I eventually found indeed that, while Monday was a holiday for the entire rest of the nation, it was not for San Francisco parking enforcement.

How deceitful and how petty.

Does San Francisco want to be known as the Insidious City, where one has to research to make sure that today there's not some variance from legal precedent?

I'll feel a little safer spending my dollars closer to home next time.

Mayor Gavin Newsom should consider an amnesty for Gotcha Day and instruct the Department of Parking and Traffic to adhere in the future to the holiday schedule the rest of the country is on.

Mitchell Rose

Berkeley

Head of DPW is a bike nut

The Bicycle Coalition informs us that Ed Reiskin, the head of the city's Department of Public Works, is a bike nut. 

Anyone who hauls his/her child around the city on the back of his/her bike should be disqualified from holding a management position with city government:

I enjoy biking because it’s the best way to get around. Last week on my day to do kid drop-off I took my five-year-old on the back of my bike. And she was really excited: ‘can we do this every morning?’ But as we rode in, my wife and her sister (who works at the school) were also driving in. We all left at the same time—and the bike got there first on top of how pleasant it was.

Just pave the streets, Ed.

Why is this legal? The American Association of Neurological Surgeons tells us that cycling is the activity that results in the most head injuries to children.