Parking Wars - Background

Background

The series' original focus was on the employees of the Philadelphia Parking Authority (PPA) and their daily work: ticketing, booting (via wheel clamp), and towing cars, and dealing with the issues that arise with the public when they try to retrieve their vehicles from the impound lots. The show also includes footage of vehicle owners interacting with employees on the street when their vehicles are ticketed, booted, or towed.

Each episode consists of three segments, shown either in chronological order of a car entering the PPA violation system (ticket, boot/tow, impound) or reverse chronological order. Many of the "Booting" segments feature the favorite team of Steve (better known by his last name, "Garfield"), a longtime PPA employee and self-professed "gadget geek," and his partner Sherry, who has "the fastest fingers on the Eastern Seaboard" according to her partner, as they travel on their assigned beats to track down cars with three tickets or more, all at least six months old, and "boot" them so that the owner cannot continue to drive the car until they pay the outstanding fines. Booting a car usually requires the PPA employee to snap on a device locking the mechanism of the front wheel so that it will not be able to move. Sometimes attaching a boot to a car is difficult because of the size of the wheels. This is unnerving because it is a race against time before the owner of the vehicle returns.

One of the PPA tow truck drivers featured in the series, Martin, died shortly before the show's debut. The show's official page at aetv.com has a section dedicated to his memory.