Parking Wars Glossary

The Black Maria:: Old-timey nickname for the original parking meter, perhaps "coined" because of its similarity to a slot machine
Cruising:: Term used by environmentalists to describe the wasteful and polluting time people spend looking for parking places
"Eating Beef Jerky":: The English translation of a Cantonese slang term for "getting a parking ticket," used amongst Chinese immigrants in L.A.
Circus Parking:: The parking needs of an on-location film shoot (trailers, equipment vans, etc), so-called because they are typically ridiculous
Kojak Parking:: Urban slang for finding parking directly outside one's destination
Lollipops:: Seattle term for old parking meter poles that have been converted to bicycle parking posts
Loonies:: Canadian slang for their dollar coin, necessary for their notoriously-expensive parking meters
"An Opportunity for Self-Improvement":: What some New Yorkers call the up to six hours a week they spend navigating alternate-side parking rules, which some use to read, knit, or learn a foreign language
Parkade:: Canadian term for parking garage
Parking Marker:: Also a marker of how bad the Boston parking situation has become, this is an object (such as a cone or lawn chair) left in a parking space to indicate that a specific person shoveled away the snow and therefore claims (and will defend) it.
Parking Ramp:: What Midwesterners, with a typical fondness for synecdoche, call an entire parking garage
Parking Strip:: Midwestern term for the grass between the sidewalk in the street (where parking is not allowed, even in the Midwest)
Parking Violation:: In most cities, the act of parking illegally; in Boston, the act of stopping one's car
Pay-and-Display:: Nickname for the increasingly common parking meter alternative in which users pay at a machine for a numbered spot
Pay-to-Pray:: Unaffectionate nickname used by critics of New York City's use of parking meters on Sundays (which brings in seven million dollars a year)
"Plug the Meter":: Slang in some parts of the South for "feeding" the meter
Pull-Through:: The act of driving through one parking place to more comfortably access another (as in a standard shopping mall lot); while not technically illegal, it can make one liable for accidents
Smart Spots:: Nickname for parking places that can detect when a car leaves and reset their meters to zero so that new users can't park on borrowed time
Surfer's Paradise Meter Maids:: Introduced on the Gold Coast in 1964 as a public relations measure in response to the putting up of parking meters along the tourist strip, they are not parking enforcers but young women in gold bikinis who feed expired parking meters
Tepper, Murray:: Hero of a popular Calvin Trillin novel who uses his knowledge of arcane New York City parking laws to spend his life sitting in his car reading newspapers (and inadvertantly becomes a cult hero)