Crossing the Line

Three weeks ago, in an effort to increase downtown parking space, the City of Oceanside added diagonal parking on Civic Center Drive, a five-block street behind City Hall.

Unfortunately, someone forgot to first measure the width of the street. In the first few days, it became obvious something was wrong: Drivers had to cross over the double yellow line to negotiate around the end of parked SUVs and big trucks.

Last week, the City corrected its mistake by sandblasting away five blocks of diagonal parking on the north side of the street and moving the double yellow center line over about 18 inches to allow more room to back out of spaces on the south side.