Once again the scammers have hit council parking meters - this time in Brisbane. Not a lot of detail has come to light as yet, but the felons appeared in court recently and have been bailed to appear again soon.
Seems that they pilfered over $800,000 in a two year period starting in January 2007.
I hazard a guess they must have been accessing the older single bay meters, not the newer 'pay and display' machines, otherwise their take would have been picked up a lot earlier.
You can read more about it here.
When I was in Brisbane late last year for the ANPSG Conference, I spent a few hours with one of the local Officers, and was surprised to see they still had quite a few 'antique' meters in operation. They were looking particularly unloved.
These things are fairly basic devices so I am not really surprised they have become the target for thieves. Some years ago, Adelaide had similar machines and vandals were simply prizing them open and making off with the coin.
I have read a few articles where gangs in the US were making keys for this type of meter, and reportedly even fixing them if they were jammed!
Whilst the new 'pay and displays' are not impregnable, they are much harder for vandals to damage and thieves to access. I reckon Brisbane might look at speeding up the old meters replacement after this.
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