Duluth, MN Parking Rules: Abandoned Vehicles (2026)

Duluth Legislative Code § 30-7 bars any person from parking, storing or leaving an abandoned vehicle on real property, including private property, within the city for 14 successive days, unless it is completely enclosed in a building or stored on private property in connection with a licensed business where the storage is necessary to the operation. Section 30-6 defines an abandoned vehicle as one the enforcement officer, meaning the building official, the official's designee, or any police officer, determines is inoperative, or one whose last registered owner has relinquished dominion and control, or one lacking current license plates and not stored in accordance with the code.

Section 30-8 requires the enforcement officer to post a notice at least eight by ten inches on the vehicle and mail a copy to the last registered owner and to the property owner; the notice must state the vehicle will be treated as improperly stored 14 days later and that failure to remove it is a misdemeanor. Section 30-9 makes failure to remove and store the vehicle after that 14-day period a misdemeanor, and § 30-10 authorizes the city to remove and dispose of the vehicle under Minnesota Statutes Chapter 168B if the owner does not act.

Separately, § 30-12 bars leaving an inoperative vehicle in a public right-of-way beyond 24 hours from disability, and § 30-13 allows one vehicle being actively restored per residential parcel if kept under a tarp or opaque screening with verifiable restoration progress.