66 Comments - NIU Grad - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:21 am: I live in a neighborhood where this isn’t that much an issue, because parking isn’t crowded enough that people think that they “own” a particular spot. That being said, I think it’s clear that no resident has ownership over any part of the street. Shoveling should focus on getting your car out of a space and not clearing out an area for yourself. - 47th Ward - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:23 am: Yes, absolutely. The streets belong to all of us, and I’m sick and tired of selfish people who think they own a parking spot. Here’s a tip, if we all shovel out a spot, we can clear the whole street. That’s what communities do, they help each other instead of only looking out for themselves. I always hated the way Mayor Daley legitimized this ugly practice. It pits neighbors against neighbors when we need to find incentives for neighbors to work together. Dibs is one of the worst things about Chicago and it should be outlawed. - Lt Guv - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:24 am: Is McCarthy some kind of Communist? - Montrose - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:24 am: I both dislike dibs and think candidates shouldn’t touch it with a ten foot pole. The winning candidate in the one that commits to shoveling your car out for you. - Station Burger - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:25 am: I voted YES Dibs lead to misunderstandings that could turn violent. We should leave it to the city to make sure our streets are clear of snow so we can park safely. - Da Big Bad Wolf - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:26 am: Aren’t they already outlawed? You’re not supposed to put your old chairs and other trash out on the street that belongs to the public. When I see that junk I take it and put it in the alley by the garbage cans where it belongs. Do these people ever think maybe someone needs to use the street during the day when they are at work? For example, a caregiver checking up on an elderly client, or a salt truck driver who worked all night and now wants to go home at the end of his shift, etc. - Ducky LaMoore - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:26 am: I voted no. But that comes with a caveat. If you physically have someone, a human being, in the spot I really don’t mind so much. You must really want/need that spot. But your lawn chairs in a parking spot are going to end up on the sidewalk. I don’t care how loud your wife yells at me out the window. You want the spot, you live in it. - Anon - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:27 am: Is it already outlawed? Or is leaving garbage in the street legal? - Oswego Willy - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:27 am: Dibs should not be outlawed. I’ll move to Alderman Burke’s street and make sure I don’t need to worry about dibs, or my alley. I’m pro-dibs, as far as the first 2-3 days… then… - Huh? - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:27 am: Absolutely not. Keep dibs. If I spent time shoveling heart attack snow to clear a spot for my car in front of my house, death to all violators of the sacred dibs. Raise the jolly roger, run out the cannon, argggh. - Swampy Corn - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:27 am: Dibs is a god given right. That wasn’t snow that fell last night, that was heavy ice slush aka widowmaker/heart attack inducing precipitation. You want it, you dig it, you dibs it. - Chicago Bars - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:29 am: Lol. What Montrose said, but with a job creation program to dynamically connect City residents with dibs shoveling opportunities across the great City of Chicago, after a public-private pilot project to determine best practices for collaborative success viz a viz shoveling operations. All monitored by a state of the art dibs and snow removal command center that will tackle this important issue head on with a laser like focus. - tgk - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:31 am: My block does year-round dibs, I fought it as much as I could and refused to dib my spot for 7 years but eventually I had to succumb to dibbing my spot. Every year after a snowstorm the mayor claims he’s sending out trucks to clear out the dibs but its a huge lie. You’d need a fleet of dozens working around the clock to rid bridgeport and pilsen alone of dibs. - Perrid - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:33 am: I voted yes, because it’s a public street. You don’t want other’s “taking advantage of your hard work”, shovel the snow back into the spot, lol. Kinda wondering what “outlawing” it means here though. If the spot is empty except for a chair or garbage can or cone or whatever, who gets the ticket? Or does outlawing it just mean the trash gets thrown away? - Mr.Black - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:34 am: Dibs is one of Chicago’s worst traditions. It pits neighbor against neighbor. People hold onto spots even after there is not much snow. The city should send around trucks clearing snow and trash. Dibs leads to damage to vehicles when the real culprit is the city. - Actual Red - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:36 am: I don’t think an outright ban achieves anything helpful, and can’t imagine it would be enforced effectively. Better to focus on improving public transit and snow removal to make it less necessary. - Henry Francis - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:39 am: Why didn’t Dellimore ask candidate Chicago Party Aunt? She knows what Chicagoans want. If you are against dibs, fine, don’t do it. Or move to Tucson. - Keyrock - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:40 am: Yes. Should be outlawed. John Kass. Need one say more? - lakeside - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:41 am: Sure, it’s a kind of repellent part of my culture, and I will absolutely die on the hill of defending it. - Bogey Golfer - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:45 am: Didn’t Mike Royko coin the term ‘dibs’? - Joe Bidenopolous - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:46 am: ===Dibs is one of Chicago’s worst traditions. It pits neighbor against neighbor.=== This, all day long. A few neighbors and I are diligently working to eliminate the dibs mentality in our neighborhood with middling success. But we also have some of the worst offenders. Some of these people will dibs a spot they didn’t even shovel. When I see this, they’re junk goes in the parkway with a note pointing out that they didn’t shovel the spot and an addendum noting there is a security camera trained on the spot if they try any shenanigans. They usually don’t come back. - Grandson of Man - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:46 am: No. Dibs is an old tradition, and it works pretty well, except for the few occasions when people still claim spots after the snow problem goes away. - Joe Bidenopolous - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:47 am: *their junk… ugh - wordslinger - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 11:50 am: If dibs are outlawed only outlaws will have dibs. I think coppers have enough on their plates without having to street adjudicate parking d-baggery. - MG85 - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:02 pm: I voted no - for many reasons but mostly against criminalizing another “thing” for Chicago to send you a ticket that could have just been levied in the form of a tax. That said, when you live on Fremont or some other HIGHLY congested street with 20 parking spaces and 700 residents, dibs is a way for folks to legitimize their actions of leaving in the dead of winter for what must be only described as a dire need. What must also be completely legal, however, is one’s ability to move said dibs and park, knowing full well of the potential consequences (keying, snowball to the windshield, etc). That last part, however, should be extremely illegal and is so. In a sense, dibs allows for individual and neighborhood ethics to reign harmoniously. Government oversight isn’t necessary as it allows, gasp, social interaction to dictate the outcome. You respect dibs? Then respect it? You don’t? Then don’t, but also don’t expect it to be respected. - lake county democrat - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:06 pm: I voted no, but would only make them legal for 24 hours after shoveling or first pull-out, whichever comes last. - Amalia - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:10 pm: Dibs is cultural law. the people who don’t believe in dibs are usually the people who are not shoveling a spot. - Cheryl44 - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:13 pm: Don’t any of you have garages? - Anonymous - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:15 pm: That McCarthy, he really stands for something. - lakeside - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:25 pm: “Some of these people will dibs a spot they didn’t even shovel.” No, no, no, no. That’s the kind of thing that gets your tires slashed where I come from. Ugh, so uncool. - jenwomon - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:25 pm: I voted no, because I like to see how inventive my neighbors get with dibs place holders. Lawn chairs are predictable. Ironing board, weight bench, and Barbie dream house just cracks me up. - VanillaMan - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:27 pm: No dibs? No shoveling. - Anonish - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:28 pm: How about we ban asking this question of candidates? - JoanP - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:30 pm: =Don’t any of you have garages?= A lot of people, particularly apartment dwellers, don’t, or folks have a one-car garage and they’re a two-car family. - Annonin' - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:47 pm: we voted “no” in part because Chicago seems to have problems enforcing actual laws on the books. Let’s work on that first. Never McCarthy had a clue, this confirms. it is like ketchup on hot dogs - Stuntman Bob's Brother - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 12:57 pm: Voted “no”, but here’s a dumb question - why can’t the city create enough parking spots for its residents such that “dibs” is not required? For instance, wherever possible, make streets one-way, and instead of having parallel parking, institute diagonal parking on one side of the street. Wouldn’t that create more, and easier to manage, parking spots? If necessary, reduce the parkway widths (you still need somewhere to pile snow), and have two rows of diagonally parked cars. Haven’t the city planners ever gone to a shopping mall? And, instead of creating summer jobs for disadvantaged youth, why not winter jobs, actually doing something needed, like shoveling snow? - Austinman - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 1:01 pm: I voted no, I see nothing wrong with “dibs”, lifelong Chicagoan. Its only temporary plus it takes a lot of work to get that spot cleaned. If they want to get rid of dibs maybe the city should plow the entire street not just the middle - A Jack - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 1:04 pm: So I have to ask, is dibs the only reason Chicagoan’s have lawn chairs? I haven’t seen anything that resembles a lawn while walking around Chicago. - Reality Check - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 1:08 pm: This dumb practice IS outlawed: You can’t put junk in the public way. It’s just not enforced. If it WAS enforced, people would have to behave in a neighborly fashion, like in every other sane, normal city. - Cheryl44 - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 1:09 pm: Joan, it was a joke. I live in a multi unit building w\o anything but street parking. But then I don’t own a car, so I get to amuse myself when the dibs discussion comes up. - 33rd Ward - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 1:09 pm: Dibs are stupid and easy to fix. Just toss the junk back into the yards. Somebody else will then park there. If a problem ensures, you know who to blame. The person who tried to privatize the common street. Just throw the junk out. That’s what we do. Hey, that looks like a nice chair. Nobody must want it if they just left it in the street. So much fun. - NoGifts - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 1:10 pm: Yes. The street is a public way. Especially yes because years ago when I tried to drop an infant and toddler off at the babysitter when I lived in the city, her whole block was covered with empty spaces “dibbed” and there was no where for me to park for 5 minutes. I moved to the suburbs and love having a driveway and all the places I go have parking without furniture piled in the street. - Flapdoodle - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 1:22 pm: The streets, as many have already said, are public where the public has the right of way. No one has a right or claim of any kind to a specific parking place on a public street. But as Actual Red points out, trying to enforce a ban is a losing proposition — improving services like snow removal and public transportation makes far more sense. - d.p.gumby - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 1:28 pm: Does “dibs” increase crimes of violence? I agree w/ the comment about a time limit and a depth limit, i.e. excessive dibbing! - DuPage Dave - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 2:00 pm: Haven’t lived in Chicago for over 30 years, but dibs was taken very seriously in those days. I beat the system by not having a car. I think the residential parking permit system might have taken some of the steam out of the dibs system, though. It restricts parking in residential areas regardless of weather. - Occam - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 2:19 pm: The City should issue a license to each individual that wishes to claim dibs on a spot. The City could charge $50 per spot and issue rules as to how dibs operates and approved dibs markers. - JoanP - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 2:41 pm: = wherever possible, make streets one-way, and instead of having parallel parking, institute diagonal parking on one side of the street. = Wouldn’t you still have the same number of spots, just on one side of the street rather than both? = If necessary, reduce the parkway widths (you still need somewhere to pile snow)= Parkways aren’t just for piling up snow. People’s Gas digs them up to check for gas leaks, the city does the same to repair water main breaks, etc. Reducing their width might make those jobs more difficult, or require tearing up the street (which obviously no one wants if it can be avoided). - West Sider - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 2:41 pm: Clearly a lot of folks here haven’t nursed a bad back for weeks after shoveling out a parked car. Dibs is enforced courtesy- and a God-given right. - Anonymous - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 3:01 pm: This single issue is what will propel Chicago Party Aunt to victory. Well, that and resurrecting the Magikist signs. - Dozer - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 3:09 pm: if you’re a neighborhood resident and park on the street, I have no problem with the idea that the spot is now yours to use to make life manageable. - Ed Equity - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 3:12 pm: Common sense, very locally controlled government should be the “chicago way” and dibs is dat. - Anonymous - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 3:24 pm: The problem is that people will leave their lawn furniture (markers) out for an extended period of time. That’s not right. Clogs up the available spots. - Huh? - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 3:44 pm: “Clogs up the available spots.” Dibs is dibs. If my dibs markers are “clogging up the available spot” that because that spot is mine by virtue of the Inalienable Right and Sacred Law of Dibs and my labor of digging out that spot. So go get your own spot and quit encroaching on mine. And don’t even think of moving the junk to make your spot bigger. - TominChicago - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 3:53 pm: I am so sick of the dibs thing. One would think that the 40 columns that Kass writes a year about dibs would have driven this topic into the ground years ago? - Blue Dog Dem - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 3:54 pm: In my short stay in Chicago, I did what many politicians did. Double-dibbed. - Left Leaner - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 4:53 pm: Dibs causes more problems than it solves. Somehow we all find parking every day when it doesn’t snow. Why should it be any different when it does snow? Shoveling out = great exercise. - revvedup - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 5:33 pm: It’s illegal under the MCC and State law to put things in the roadway, it makes plow drivers plow the junk to the curb, and unless you have assigned parking by your municipality, the space isn’t yours anyway, even if you shovel it clean. I like how people have garages filled with junk, park on the street, and complain about a) being plowed in, and b) somebody stole ‘their’ spot. - Wensicia - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 5:43 pm: Past practice rules. Law enforcement has more serious issues to enforce than this nonsense. - wordslinger - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 7:29 pm: –I am so sick of the dibs thing. One would think that the 40 columns that Kass writes a year about dibs would have driven this topic into the ground years ago?– Be fair. Sometimes, the dude has to scribble about something other than the agreed-upon-grievance that every ding-dong on Fox News and Breitbart were yammering about two days ago. - Blue Dog Dem - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 7:37 pm: According to the latest climate report sounds like this will be a mute point some day. - wordslinger - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 8:15 pm: –According to the latest climate report sounds like this will be a mute point some day.– If only you could be “mute” some day, troll. “Moot,” Einstein. - Blue Dog Dem - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 8:49 pm: Moot. Mute. My Donepezil doesn’t always work the way it’s supposed to. - wordslinger - Monday, Nov 26, 18 @ 9:06 pm: –Moot. Mute. My Donepezil doesn’t always work the way it’s supposed to.– Alzheimers is a laugh riot in entitled-victim troll -land. - occasional quipper - Tuesday, Nov 27, 18 @ 8:27 am: I believe its actually “moo point”, as per Joey Tribbiani. - Jerry - Tuesday, Nov 27, 18 @ 10:23 am: Hard work deserves the rewards. - Da Big Bad Wolf - Tuesday, Nov 27, 18 @ 1:21 pm: When I don’t want who called me hear background noise, I put my phone on mute. When the pharmacist messages me to pick up a prescription I already picked up, I put my phone on moot. Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.