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A rogue driver on the Upper East Side has found a loophole to get around parking tickets — removing his license plates.
The Post witnessed a man in a blue Honda Odyssey park on East 85th Street between York and First Avenues, before yanking the Connecticut license plate off the back of the car and stashing it in a plastic bag.
The man then strutted into a nearby apartment building at 424 E. 85th Street, where he works as a super.
Neighborhood residents say the slippery scofflaw had been pulling the same trick for months, to avoid being slapped with parking tickets and being towed.
They said they called the cops multiple times on the serial parking abuser but officials said police are not able to tow vehicles that have no plates — so-called “ghost cars” — unless the city Sanitation Department first marks them for removal.
But every time Sanitation was called, the car was long gone by the time they arrived, neighbors said.
After The Post witnessed the scofflaw removing his plates last week, a reporter confronted him.
He refused to give his name and gave a convoluted excuse for his lawbreaking, claiming he recently injured a pinky finger in a motorcycle accident, lost work, and was too broke to cough up $680 he already owes in parking tickets.
“I can’t pay all of that right now,” he told The Post. “I gotta eat! I got my wife. I don’t have the money right now.”
It’s no one’s “business” whether he parks illegally, he defiantly added.
He claimed his illicit parking scheme has only been going on for three weeks, but neighbors claimed he’s been doing it since the summer — and routinely leaves his car in front of a fire hydrant, a $115 fine in itself.
“God forbid something happens and [firefighters] can’t access the fire hydrant,” said Tim, a 37-year-old building manager on the block. “That’s the last thing they should worry about when they’re rolling up to a fire.”
Another neighbor, who said she and others had put in countless 311 reports about the super scofflaw, fumed the city is enabling the illicit parking scheme by not seizing his car.
“If the guy knows [cops] are going to come and they’re not going to give him a ticket . . . He’s going to continue to do it,” she said. “We’ve said, ‘Boot the car. Tow the car!’”
Councilwoman Julie Menin (D-Manhattan), who represents the neighborhood, said her office has fielded complaints about the “ghost car” and asked the NYPD and Sanitation to investigate.
“No one can flout local laws for their personal parking convenience,” she said. “Creating a short-term ghost car by temporarily removing your license plate impedes the city’s ability to investigate and will not be tolerated.”
Cars without plates valued at less than $1250 can be towed by the Sanitation Department, but the Honda Odyssey is worth more, making it the NYPD’s job to remove the vehicle.
Sanitation Department spokesman Joshua Goodman insisted the agency is conducting joint operations with NYPD to clear streets of ghost cars.
He said the agency has removed 7,107 vehicles from the street this year through Nov. 26, compared to a total of 4,518 for all of 2022.
“The Adams Administration has made removing derelict and abandoned vehicles from the streets a priority,” he said.
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