New Haven, CT Parking Rules: Towing & Impound Rights (2026)

Section 29-119(a) of the Code of General Ordinances sets a single towing fee of seventy-seven dollars ($77.00) whenever a vehicle is towed for being illegally parked on a public street, illegally parked on private property, illegally parked in a fire zone, impounded for unpaid parking violation fines, abandoned, inoperable or a traffic hazard. The same subsection states flatly that no mileage fees shall be charged, so a tower cannot add a per mile line to a New Haven city tow. Tow and storage fees for any other circumstance, which is the category a crash tow or a consent tow falls into, must instead be consistent with state regulated fees, meaning the maximum schedule the Connecticut Department of Motor Vehicles adopts by regulation under Conn. Gen. Stat. Sec. 14-66. Section 29-94 makes the same point for winter work and authorizes a tower to charge the fees the state DMV allows for a snow emergency tow rather than the ordinance rate.

Storage runs on its own schedule under section 29-119(b). A tower may charge twenty dollars ($20.00) for each twenty-four hours or any portion of it, but no storage fee at all may be charged for the twenty-four hours of the first day. After the fifth day of storage the permitted rate rises to twenty-four dollars ($24.00) for each twenty-four hours or portion of it. Section 29-119(c) confirms that storage is charged in addition to the towing charge and any applicable penalties, so a released vehicle typically carries three separate items: the tow, the accrued storage, and the parking fine that caused the tow.

Two charges are unusual to New Haven because the city, not the driver, pays them. Under section 29-119(e) the fee for applying and removing a vehicle impound boot is fifty-five dollars ($55.00), invoiced to the city and certified by the director of the Department of Traffic and Parking, and it sits on top of any later towing and storage. The parking violation fine that permits a boot to be applied is fifty dollars ($50.00). Section 29-119(d) prices a temporary removal, where the vehicle is moved without being taken to the tower yard and then put back as near as practicable to the same spot, at thirty-five dollars ($35.00), again paid by the city, with a fifty dollar ($50.00) fine on the underlying violation. Section 29-31(a)(3) is the authority for that short move and names utility emergencies, street cleaning and snow removal as the occasions for it.

Release is governed by section 29-31(a)(2), repeated for fire zone tows in section 29-75 and snow emergency tows in section 29-86: the vehicle stays in custody until the owner furnishes evidence of identity, current address and ownership or right of possession, and pays the towing and storage fees, the booting fee if one was applied, and any parking penalties owed to the city. Section 29-119(c) requires every tower to post the rate schedule in a prominent location visible and readable to owners as they pay, on a sign meeting the specifications of the chief of police, and that sign must also state that review process forms are available at that location.

Section 29-119(f) gives the person whose vehicle was towed a right to a tow review on written request stating the reason, made to the Department of Traffic and Parking within fifteen (15) days of the alleged violation. An administrative officer in the Department of Police Services or the parking enforcement administrator conducts it, and if the reviewer finds the underlying charge unfounded the city refunds the towing fee and the parking fine is nullified. Section 29-119(g) preserves a further right to a hearing before a parking violations hearing officer for anyone unsatisfied with that decision.

Only towers on the municipal towers list may perform city towing. Section 29-118 caps that list at ten (10) licensed towers, has the chief of police rotate assignments on a fair and nondiscriminatory basis, and sets entry standards that shape service in practice: an on premises employee twenty-four hours a day, at least three radio equipped tow trucks on duty, at least two impound boots, and storage space for at least one hundred vehicles within the city. Listed towers must accept MasterCard and Visa with no additional processing fee, and must hand a city supplied complaint form to each person whose vehicle was towed. The dollar figures above come from the December 18, 2006 restatement of the chapter by Ord. No. 1432, so confirm the schedule posted at the tow yard before disputing a bill.