Portland, ME Parking Rules: Towing & Impound Rights (2026)

Article IV of Chapter 28 licenses every wrecker operating in Portland and sets the maximum it may bill a vehicle owner. Sec. 28-122(a) applies the schedule to any tow taken without the owner's consent, and it names private lot tows requested by a lot owner or manager alongside police requested abandoned vehicle, snow, scofflaw and accident scene tows, so a downtown private lot cannot bill above the same ceilings the police rotation works under. Those ceilings are $150.00 per non-accident tow, $175.00 per accident tow, $165.00 for a vehicle with dual tires on the rear axle, and $270 for a vehicle and trailer or two vehicles moved at the same time. Recovery is the one place the meter runs: a vehicle that is off-road, submerged or rolled over adds $80, plus $80 per hour after the first hour.

Two escape hatches sit in Sec. 28-122(b). If you reach your car before the wrecker hooks up, no towing fee may be charged at all. If it is already hooked but has not started to leave, $40.00 in cash to the driver buys the release, and the ordinance lets the operator keep its place in the police towing list rotation so there is no incentive to refuse. Sec. 28-121 pins down both moments: "hooked" means connection by chains, hooks, slings or other mechanical means such that the vehicle cannot be moved independently of the wrecker, and departure from the scene means the vehicle is fully attached and the wrecker has begun to move. A winter variation in subsection (c) sets $25 where a tow operator shovels your car out during a snow ban but has not hooked it, and $40 where it is shoveled out and hooked up.

Storage is $50.00 per day or part of a day and does not start until twenty-four hours after the tow, so a prompt retrieval carries no storage charge at all. Maine's statutory ceiling in 29-A M.R.S. section 1857 is $1,500 per 30 days, which is the same $50 a day, so Portland sits at the state ceiling rather than beneath it. Vehicles held on City property are cheaper: $25.00 covers impoundment plus the first twenty-four hours, then $10.00 for each day or part thereof. Wreckers may add a $40.00 release fee for pickups after 7:00 p.m. and before 7:00 a.m. any day of the week, and all day Sunday and on official City holidays. A second tow of the same vehicle at the City's request costs another $150.00.

Sec. 28-123 carries the location and timing duties. The storage and release facility must be inside the city or within a seven mile radius of Portland City Hall. A vehicle may not be moved to a lot outside the city until it has gone unclaimed for thirty days, and then only on prior written notice to the police chief. Vehicles must be towed, not driven, to the storage lot. Licensees must release a vehicle within one hour of the owner's request, and Sec. 28-137(b)(5) makes a written statement of willingness to release vehicles twenty-four hours a day, every day of the year, part of the license application. A private lot operator may not charge the owner anything unless a sign warning that unauthorized vehicles will be towed at the owner's expense is posted clearly at each entrance and exit of the nonresidential property, or is clearly visible from all entrances, and that sign must include information about how a missing vehicle may be located. Current rates must be conspicuously posted at the release facility.

Booting is licensed separately under Article VIII, added in 2015. A private parking lot may not use a boot without a city license and a $100.00 fee, and Sec. 28-290 requires red signs no smaller than 48 inches by 30 inches at the entrance, the exit and the payment device of any lot with 20 to 50 spaces, with an extra sign for each additional 50 spaces or part thereof. The boot itself must carry the removal fee, a 24-hour phone number, a statement of your rights, and the date and time it went on. The booter must remove it free if you return before the boot is fully attached, must remove it within thirty minutes of your call, must take cash or card on site, and must refund the fee if the City investigates your complaint and finds the boot was placed in violation of the article. Sec. 28-291 makes it unlawful to boot an occupied vehicle or one parked in accordance with the property's terms of use.