My sister called me all pissed off this morning coz she just learned that the parking in front of Virgin Megastores downtown where she parks has been taken over by valets. You are not allowed to park your car yourself at any time of the day apparently. If you want to park the car in the downtown parking lot for an entire day, you now have to pay 9,000 LL and give them the keys to your car…
I personally wouldn’t give my car to any valet. I’d rather park a kilometer away and walk.
I once went to Khaymet el Sanyour in Antelias for breakfast, and the valet guy had just gotten to the work on his mobilette. So he came to my car and handed me a number. I told him I’d rather park it myself, he then says “shou mfakkara Porsche?” (“You think you’re driving a Porsche?”) The guy is driving a mobilette and is giving me crap about my car… wtf…
Valet Parking is always a privilege, but in reality its a crapy service, and the administration of this service is always not responsible of ANYTHING, الادارة غير مسؤوله عن السيارة وما Ùيها من ممتلكات!!!! wtf, i’m giving you my car keys and i’m paying you my money, but you still not responsible, this is pure bullshit.
“shou mfakkara Porsche?â€
La’ Ducati!!!!
After that lame return I would have taken it upon myself to grab the dushbag’s head and slam my car’s door on it repeatedly (hopefully an obscure Porsche, like an an old 914), perhaps then he will learn how to respect people…or be paraplegic for the rest of his life…he was useless anyway.
Sorry got cut off in traffic today, and taking my rage of here instead of being a Antar without a clue.
You are right Majd,
That’s the best part about valet parking companies, is that they are not responsible for what happens to ur car.
Anyway I don’t let them park it or take it and I ask them to call the manager if they don’t let me park it myself and most of the times, they just shut up and let u park.
Legally speaking, every person that drives a car wihtout a legal document permitting him to do so by owner of said car should have a general driver’s licence (3moumeh) like taxi drivers. most of those guys working Valet service don’t have a license let a lone a 3moume, so even if they do want to be held responsible, their insurance won’t cover unless the whole staff is properly qualified…
and Valet’s don’t park cars, they abandon them. not to mention they always end up loosing your key or your ticket and taking forever to bring it back
i don’t know if it is true but i heard a special report about Valet parking on TV a couple of weeks ago,it seems that the valet parking companies are created by a certain political party in order to track the movement of designated people … don’t know if its true or not, but in case it is, it’s creepy!
I doubt it Joelle,
they fail in tracking my car to which they have a key and ticket number, how can they track someone?
but i see the point…someone should make a big budget political thriller movie based on Lebanese politics…we seem to have the latest in surveillance and monitoring techniques being used and tested every day
Oh yeah i forgot to add one more thing, what about the 9,000LL !!! what’s with that??? does it really cost this much for parking lot owners??? if anyone has an answer on that, please enlighten me, because i have no clue !!!
Yeah it used to be a 2,500 flat rate for the entire day (if you get there before it fills up). I park there for work, but now it’s cheaper (and closer) to park in souks (3,000 for first 3 hours compared to 5,000).
I was told there’s a flat rate 2,500 parking in BIEL though, have yet to check it out, anyone know anything about it?
Can’t u guys just use the subway??? :))))))
well the 9000 is not the biggest issue, in other cities around the world is costs as much per hour to park your car…not comparing the cities, but the little real estate your car takes does cost money and is in fact very valuable. that’s how they price parking…it’s fair i think, but only so if you can’t park for free on the streets, in which most places in Beirut (maybe not BCD) it is…
It would be great if they retrofit the Charles Helou parking lot and include a well integrated bus line within the Beirut Central District. so you park your car there with a membership discount and you get a free buss ticket
HAHAHAHAHA at Nadine… AHAHAHAHAHAHA… Subway… you can’t go to work on a sandwicheria…. 😛
cause in leb subway means the sandwich place…
i wish we still had the old trams in the city… that would be amazing and so practical
New York its like 20$ for half an hour depending on the location. So 6$ for the whole day in Downtown Beirut is pretty good.
Ohhh shit! I know a lot of people who work in downtown who park there, and they’re NOT going to be happy! The reasons keep piling up as to why I will never own a car as long as I’m in Beirut!
Mark, you don’t really need a car in NYC, the government provides all modes of public transportation, whereas in Lebanon having a car is a necessity, you don’t have a reliable mode of public transportation. You can say “take the bus”, but if I’m wearing a suit to go to work, I’m gonna be drenched in sweat and smell like crap when i get to my job.
Another thing, salaries in Lebanon aren’t very high. If someone makes 1,000$ a month working at a bank in downtown beirut they would have to pay over 20% of their salary just to get to work! 120$ just for parking + maybe 100$ in gas. This entire situation needs to be worked out, it’s getting ridiculous
well i think it would be easy to start a downtown bus service starting from large parking lots around the city. With nice buses catering to parking lot users. Call it a micro plan to gauge succeess and then move to bona fide regulated bus route circling the bcd. Options are endless but lots of lebanese people will still insist to use their own cars
Mark,
Just curious. What’s the annual earned income average (or salary) in Lebanon?
I could tell you though what it is in NYC…
Ditto what Chahe said.