311 v. 911:

Every morning when I go out of my building, there are two or three cars parked in front of the fire hydrant that have clearly been there all night. These cars never have tickets. This afternoon, I decided to do my civic duty (and maybe prevent my apartment from burning down since the firemen won't have any access to water) and try to report this so that the cops can go around and ticket them.

I figured, not an emergency, so I'd call 311, the city hall phone number. The same number that you call to report a dead bird in the city, in case you're curious. The woman who answered the phone was very nice, but she told me I should call 911 when the cars are there. I hate to call 911 without a real emergency, so I don't know whether I'll call or not tomorrow morning when I bet there will be cars there. People, don't park in front of the fire hydrants. If there is a fire and people die, you could be in a pile of trouble (I believe that someone was convicted of reckless endangerment or maybe involuntary homicide after an instance of that once). And it's not like there isn't plenty of parking in Hyde Park. So you have to walk and extra block or so. It's not the end of the world.