Time Machine: The parking meter

CEDAR RAPIDS - The first parking meter, the Magee-Hale Park-O-Meter No. 1 was installed in Oklahoma City on July 16, 1935.

Carlton Cole Magee, who came up with the idea, was an Iowa native, born in 1872 in Fayette. He graduated from Iowa State Teachers College (later the University of Northern Iowa) and Upper Iowa University. Magee was a newspaper editor in Albuquerque in the early 1920s when he helped uncover the Teapot Dome scandal, in which Secretary of the Interior Albert B. Fall, a former New Mexico senator, was convicted of renting government lands to oil companies for personal favors.

Magee came to Oklahoma City in 1927. As editor of the Oklahoma News and a member of the city's Chamber of Commerce traffic committee, he was asked to come up with a way to charge for parking in order to reduce congestion downtown. He took his idea for a timed parking device to mechanical engineering professor Gerald Hale, and together they developed the parking meter.

Magee later applied for the patent on the world's first coin-controlled meter.

By 1941, 251 American cities were using meters. Not only did they keep all-day parkers off the main streets, they made money for the cities that used them. After the initial novelty wore off, parking meters were not viewed favorably by the public, who considered them taxation without due process. Merchants, however, loved them because they discouraged all-day parkers and resulted in a greater turnover of customers.

The first Iowa city to install parking meters was Sioux City. They were removed, however, when the Iowa Supreme Court objected to the way the meter money was handled.

Ottumwa was the only city in the state to have the meters when they were installed in February 1946 at a cost of $58 each. After a month, three blocks of downtown Ottumwa were lined with 100 meters. They were so successful the public safety department ordered 300 more.

Iowa City approved installation of parking meters in August 1946 after extensive research by a University of Iowa engineering committee.

'The investigating committee, headed by Prof. Huber O. Croft, conducted an examination of the five meters submitted to the city. The group of engineers not only studied the devices from a structural point of view but also took into consideration reports from two or three other engineering schools,” reported The Gazette. The 157 meters purchased from Park-O-Meter at $65 each were placed on both sides of the street in the area bounded by Washington and College streets, between Clinton and Dubuque streets, by the end of September.

The meters were demonstrated in Cedar Rapids in 1936, but local businessmen opposed them and the city's legal staff was concerned about their validity.

The city held out for 10 more years before purchasing less-expensive Miller parking meters for a one-year trial in November 1946.

As workmen began installing the units, at First Avenue and First Street West, city officials congregated to watch. A photo, published on page one of The Gazette, showed patrolmen F.A. Ahring, Merle Burton and Scotty Duncan along with Police Chief Tom Condon and Public Safety Commissioner Gordon Hughes inspecting the first meter.

Expecting a surfeit of complaints, Condon said, 'We are prepared for three weeks to a month of complaints until we get people used to the idea.” An officer from the Omaha police department came to Cedar Rapids to help with the orientation.

'He says he never heard such complaining as there was in Omaha for the first three weeks after meters were installed,” Condon said. 'Now, he says you couldn't get the meters out of Omaha.”

The Chamber of Commerce switched to automatic, no-lever Park-O-Meters in 1951. The old meters had proved troublesome for the city from the time they were installed, according to Safety Commissioner E.A. Prochaska.

Magee-Hale Park-O-Meter Co.'s 500,000th meter was installed in Cedar Rapids in 1956. An ad campaign featuring aerial scenes of Cedar Rapids' loop, a parking lot and a view of curbside meters was distributed nationwide.

As late as 1998, Park-O-Meters were purchased by the city, but by 2014, Cedar Rapids went to solar-powered 'smart” meters manufactured by Digital Payment Technologies.

Cedar Rapids 1946 Parking Meter Rules

' Metered parking was in effect daily except Sunday from 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m.

' Motorists were urged to park correctly at the meters. Parallel parkers should have the front wheel of the car parallel with the meter. Angle parkers should line up the meter post with the center of the car.

' Meter posts were color coded. Aluminum allowed 12 minutes for a penny and an hour for a nickel; blue allowed 24 minutes for a penny or two hours for a nickel; brown, in front of the post office only, two pennies bought 24 minutes.

Instructions to use meters

1. Insert whatever sum of money required for the length of time you want to park. You can buy up to two hours parking in 12-minute chunks

2. Turn the handle after each coin

3. If the meter clock shows some time remaining, when you arrive, you need not insert a coin unless you expect to stay longer than the unexpired time

4. You may insert either nickels or pennies, but don't put a penny in the nickel slot. The penny will be lost and you get no time.

5. There is no limit to the length of time you can park in a given place. Two hours is the most you can purchase at once but you can feed the meter as often as you like.