Vehicle for Change
  • Home
    • Letters from Earth
    • Host the Vehicle
    • About
  • Story
    • About Aurora
    • Blog
    • People
    • Gallery
  • Universal Design
    • The Vehicle as Prototype
    • Design Gallery
  • Materials
    • Shell & Insulation
    • Floors, Walls, Furnishings >
      • Floors
      • Walls
      • Upholstery
      • Sealants & Finishes
  • Interior
    • Floor Plans & Cross Sections
    • Flexible Furniture
    • Appliances
    • Storage
    • Lighting
    • Color & Culture
    • Feng Shui
  • Systems
    • Purification
    • Electricity >
      • Thermoelectric generator
    • Water >
      • Plumbing
      • Greenhouse
    • Climate Control
    • Waste
    • Mobility >
      • Vehicles
      • Fuels
      • The Road
  • Contact
    • Mailing List
  • Finances
    • In Kind Donations
    • Loans
    • Spending Plan
    • Current Financial Status
  • The Book
  • Resources
  • Road Life

Urban Anchor Roller Coaster

12/29/2016

0 Comments

 
Working with the city of Berkeley about parking and showing my Vehicle has been quite the roller coaster ride.  Technically, RVs can only be parked 72 hours in one location, but this is mostly only enforced when someone complains.  

When I first arrived, I was parked on a noisy main street for a few days while negotiations were underway. It gave my project good exposure, but my roof was shaded and my batteries ran low.  Then I was happily anchored on a quiet street with a number of other trailers and bus conversions until a cranky neighbor complained.  

Then I moved to the front of the city council bulding to show the council members and the mayor what they would be voting on, and one they approved my project, waited to be assigned a designated spot that would be reserved for me. I expected that to take place within a few days, but it dragged on, and so did the rain, so that I ran out of battery power.  

At that point, the two branches of city government turned out to have different views about what had been agreed on.  After lots of back and forth, and yes and no, I was offered a month of parking so I could show the community my Vehicle, and talk about the tiny home, environmental and disability access parts of my project.  

But although, without an authorized address, I was unable to promote any open house events, one side of the equation wants to count the time I was parked in front of the council building waiting for news.  Since it's a bad time of year to try to organize anything, and I have out of town committments January 8-14, I'm back to moving every few days until we can make better use of my presence. 

It's a somewhat unnerving state of affairs for me. Last night I got an official knock on the door at 9 pm in a spot a city official suggested was out of the way, where I was unlikely to be bothered.  Now I'm off to speak to someone who can authorize or evict me.  
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Aurora Levins Morales is a chronically ill and disabled writer, historian, visual artist, and activist

    Archives

    January 2017
    December 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    December 2014
    June 2014
    April 2014
    December 2013

    Categories

    All
    Consultants
    Design
    Fuel
    Trucks

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly