The Best Ways to Locate Your Towed Vehicle in Los Angeles
There is no worse feeling than parking your car somewhere in Los Angeles and later finding out it got towed away mysteriously. At first, you may think someone stole your vehicle if you’re not aware of any traffic or parking violations made. After all, there probably won’t be any warning signs posted where you parked either.
So, why would your vehicle get towed? The most common reasons are parking on private property without permission from the owner or parking on public property longer than allowed. If you have violated one of these rules, the property owner or city can tow your vehicle without letting you know about it first.
Besides, how would the owner or city be able to contact you? They may see your license plate on your vehicle, but they won’t immediately know your cell phone number. Instead, your vehicle will get towed, and the towing company will notify you via mail after a couple of days.
Any reputable towing company will notify the police about the tow because they are expecting you to call them to report your car missing. At that point, the police will inform you that your car has been towed to a particular towing company’s tow yard. They should give you the phone number and address of the tow yard so that you contact them to retrieve your car.
The ideal situation is when towing company signs are posted in the location where your vehicle was towed. You’ll often see this on public properties as a courtesy to people who violate parking rules. However, if your vehicle was parked on private property, there likely won’t be any signs posted. So you’ll have to do your own investigatory work instead.
When you have violated parking laws in Los Angeles, the police are the ones who will impound your vehicle. But rather than your car getting towed to a private towing company’s property, your car will get towed to a police parking garage for storage. The good news is your vehicle will remain safe in the garage and will be easy to locate and retrieve. The bad news is you’ll have to pay a lot of citations and fines before the police will give you the car back. If you don’t pay the fines, the police may auction off your car to cover the fees you owe them.
If you want to determine whether your vehicle was towed to a police garage in Los Angeles, you can use the Los Angeles Official Police Garages website. It lets you search the public records regarding all the towed vehicles stored at police garages in Los Angeles. If your car is at one of these garages, the database will be able to retrieve a record of it.
It is easy to search for a vehicle on the Los Angeles Official Police Garages website. The two key pieces of information you’ll need to enter are the vehicle’s license plate number and the state which issued it. You can also use the VIN as an alternative source of information too. Now begin the search, and it should show you which Los Angeles-based police garage is holding your vehicle. The Vehicle Information Impound Center keeps the police garage database updated on an hourly basis. So keep referring back to the Los Angeles Official Police Garages website every 60 minutes to see if new information about your vehicle is posted.
If the database fails to retrieve a record of your car, don’t assume your car is not at a police garage just yet. Perhaps someone made a clerical error when the details of your car were put into the database. You can find out by using a phone to call the Los Angeles Official Police Garages so you can speak to them in person. They’ll be able to do a more thorough human search for your vehicle.
On the other hand, your vehicle won’t be towed to a police garage if it was removed from private property. All vehicles towed from private properties get transported to the nearest tow yard. The same towing company will usually manage the tow yard, but it could also get sent to a partnering towing company’s tow yard too. But which towing company is it? That’s what you have to find out.
Sometimes, the property owner can give you this information because they probably called the towing company in the first place. If they are decent enough, they will give you the towing company’s phone number as a courtesy to you. But if they don’t, you’ll have to either research towing companies in the area online or call the police to see if a record of your tow has been filed.
Summary
Cars get towed in Los Angeles when they are trespassing on private property or violating public parking laws or regulations.
A public violation will cause the police to impound your vehicle and have it transported to one of their police garages in the city. You’ll need to contact the police or use the Los Angeles Official Police Garages website to find your vehicle.
If a private property owner had your vehicle towed, it would end up in a towing yard somewhere in the city. You can usually find the tow yard by asking the property owner or calling the police for assistance. If these two options don’t work, start calling different local tow trucking companies by getting their contact information off the internet.
Sometimes, property signs are posted that indicate which towing company or police garage to contact in the event that your vehicle is towed. However, you cannot expect to be lucky enough to have this convenience.
