New rules: No parking in your front yard

Drive through the older neighborhoods north of Mountlake Terrace City Hall, and they're everywhere.

Boats, modest vacation trailers, huge recreational vehicles, junkers — some on blocks, others sagging on flat tires — plus an assortment of family cars and pickups, presumably in running condition.

Many are parked on grass or patches of loose gravel, making them illegal as of March 15. The city is offering free driveway-construction permits, which cost up to $200, through Sept. 8.

Mayor Jerry Smith estimates that about 10 percent of the city's 6,000 households are in violation of the new parking rules. But he said residents generally support the rules, approved March 6 by the City Council.

"Most people are pretty happy. They realize Mountlake Terrace is going to start growing," Smith said, and they care about the city's appearance. "We got a lot of compliments on doing it."

The city took more heat in 2001, when it imposed its first round of stricter rules on residential parking, said Police Chief Scott Smith.

Mountlake Terrace had a "culture" of junk vehicles and other nuisances in yards, he said. Then the city cracked down, creating rules about trashy properties and limiting backyards to no more than four vehicles, operable or not.

"What's unbelievable is the visual change since 2001," the police chief said.

In 2002, a citywide survey turned up 849 violations of parking and nuisance codes, said City Manager John Caulfield. In 2003, a similar survey found only 368.

Now the codes are tougher still.

Rules for residential parking changed significantly last month when the City Council OK'd a large package of code amendments that updated the city's laws on parking, fire, nuisance and animal-control issues.

"We're trying to prevent this idea that you can pull your vehicle up in your front yard, and it dies there, and you leave it forever," Mayor Smith said.

The latest changes say:

• Vehicles in front of homes must be parked on improved surfaces — driveways, parking pads or paved ribbon strips. Concrete, asphalt or environmentally friendly materials such as Grasscrete are acceptable, and city permits are required for new construction. RVs also are permitted on maintained grass in a home's side yard.

• Vehicles that are not operable must be stored in a fully enclosed structure. If vehicles parked outdoors stop working, residents have 30 days to repair them before the storage rule applies.

• Instead of four vehicles, now no more than two may be parked in a backyard.

• Vehicles parallel-parked along curbs must face in the correct direction.

For information on driveway construction, call civil engineer Kevin Kinsella, 425-744-6272.

Diane Brooks: 425-745-7802 or dbrooks@seattletimes.com