Tonight there is a meeting about parking issues in downtown north. I just pasted this classic Bob Dylan track into the debate, on another site.

“Don’t follow leaders, watch the pawking metaws” to me means both get involved and stay low tech. I think the idea of feeding a coin into a machine was repugnant to the hipsters of the day. Why should we accept it any more now, just because the meters are smarter (than we are — soon you can either pay for four hours of time or bet your fee on a game of chess, and lose).
Not sure exactly what I think about residential parking permits; my inclination is to try to get commercial real estate interests (landlords) to pay for the problem, and pass it on to their tenants (local business) who should pay their employees enough so that they can afford pay parking closer to their jobs. Or at least residents of Palo Alto can and should ask this of Council and commissioners.

In a related matter, I am researching a minimum wage for workers here well above the state and federal level. What about $50 per hour barristas pouring my what, $7 cappucino? So that even the lowly barrista, making $50 x 20 hours a week ($50,000 per year), can afford to rent here? Would that work its way up to the billion-dollar excess of the landlords (Palo Alto Weekly “Info Palo Alto” said that between 1985 and 2010 value of commercial real estate rose from $5 B to $25 B, a delta of $20 B, closely held, but to whose gain is the growth?

LOOK OUT! as the kid in the vid says.