Some car owners say they think the city is so anxious to make money off parking fines that they ticket cars prematurely. Wendy Chandler, a staff member at Harvard's Office of Government and Community Affairs, says she has seen metermaids flip meters to zero when they have only a few minutes left.

"They go in front of the meter and turn the dial around until it goes to zero. If it has two to five minutes on it they give it one good flip or more," Chandler says, adding "I don't look out for it. I just see it in passing or look out the window and see them doing it."

Flynn says, however, that the meter maids are just checking to see whether coins are jammed in the meters.

If today's parking hassles seem bad, tomorrow's problems may be horrendous, city officials say.

"You have a very large and growing industrial structure, many new buildings have been put up, many new jobs have been created, and many more people are coming in," says City Councillor Duehay.

And Teso warns that additional development might create more difficulties. "Parking is at a manageable level now," he says. "If development keeps going, then we'll have problems."

Cambridge is already the third most densely populated city in the U.S., after Manhattan and Newark, Teso says.

And "there are EPA restrictions which restrict the number of parking spaces which can be created," Healy says. "There have been additional spaces in Harvard Square created by private developers, but the clear fact is these lots cost money."

Underground

Given the EPA restrictions, City Councillor Walsh says he thinks underground parking could be a solution. "The land under the street belongs to the city, so I suppose we could get a private developer to do it and work out a deal to the benefit of the city and neighbors," Walsh says.

But Duehay disagrees with Walsh's proposal, calling it "futuristic" and too expensive. "I'm basically sort of against that. We'd have to have huge bond issues. We're restricted because of Proposition Two and a Half," Duehay says, referring to the Massachusetts state law which restricts the amount of revenue cities can raise and how they can do it.

Instead, "It seems more practical to require buildings to provide their own parking," Duehay says. "As far as transients, I would encourage them to use public transportation."

Other officials say that the best way to improve the parking situation is to curb the development which leads to the problem. "We can try to channel the development that hasn't yet occurred to other areas," Duehay says. "Many of the neighborhoods feel overwhelmed by the parking situation." He adds, "Maybe the thing to do is to impose a city-wide moratorium on new development until the city looks at the situation."

"The main long-term solution is to impose long term restrictions on development," fellow City Councillor Sullivan says. "There is no way we can add large numbers of new parking spaces."

But Healy says he opposes restricting industrial development in Cambridge for revenue reasons.