My OperaNew Car. Interesting Hassle.
Thursday, February 26, 2009 5:14:03 PM
The editor is in the process of buying a new car. Liked the old one, but it died. Had a 2000 VW Bug for 17 years back when, and got a case of Budweiser for its spare parts. What's this got to do w/DC, You ask. Patience.
So he gets the new car from a dealer in Falls Church which he has dealt with since the mid-80's,
when the VW died. The paper work is amazing. One starts with temporary tags, goes to 3D and gets a 30-day visitors Ward 2 Parking Permit. Then one does it again.
It seems that with sales to residents of MD or VA, the paper work is done almost immediately, including parking permits for places like Arlington. With DC, they have only in the last few years managed, most of the time, not to send a runner down into DC and run it through the bureaucracy by hand.
In chatting with the paperwork guy at the dealer, another problem is the Residential Parking Program. Sometimes, when requested and paid for, DC sends it back. Sometimes they don't. (Sounds like an M&M ad.) He can't really figure out the system. It's almost as if it's not integrated into what system they have in our DMV back offices.
The editor understands that the DMV had Wang computers a decade too long, well after Wang had quit making computers. (They are not alone: the State Department had the same problem.) So apparently over the last few years DC has gotten better with the car dealers than before. But they still need to work better with industry.
There is still catching up to do with the surrounding jurisdictions.
So he gets the new car from a dealer in Falls Church which he has dealt with since the mid-80's,
when the VW died. The paper work is amazing. One starts with temporary tags, goes to 3D and gets a 30-day visitors Ward 2 Parking Permit. Then one does it again.
It seems that with sales to residents of MD or VA, the paper work is done almost immediately, including parking permits for places like Arlington. With DC, they have only in the last few years managed, most of the time, not to send a runner down into DC and run it through the bureaucracy by hand.
In chatting with the paperwork guy at the dealer, another problem is the Residential Parking Program. Sometimes, when requested and paid for, DC sends it back. Sometimes they don't. (Sounds like an M&M ad.) He can't really figure out the system. It's almost as if it's not integrated into what system they have in our DMV back offices.
The editor understands that the DMV had Wang computers a decade too long, well after Wang had quit making computers. (They are not alone: the State Department had the same problem.) So apparently over the last few years DC has gotten better with the car dealers than before. But they still need to work better with industry.
There is still catching up to do with the surrounding jurisdictions.
