In Portland, OR up around 21st street in the Pearl district there used to be these empty lots that were for businesses or something during the day, they might still be there. Like 15-20 car lots.

At night when you'd be going down to 21st for drinks or something and there was nowhere to park the big empty lots were super tempting but they were always completely empty and had 'do not park here or you will get towed' signs.

Well I was with a friend and convinced her to park in one of those empty lots because we were only supposed to be there for like a half an hour or something stupid. Anyway we park in the empty lot, get out of the car and start walking up the one block to the street we wanted to be on.

So we exit the car and start walking the block or two up to where we want to be, and almost immediately a tow truck comes flying past us. That can't possibly be for us already right?

It was for us! We ran back to the car but the guy had backed into the lot dropped some kind of hoist thing backed under her car and in the few seconds it took us to get there it was 'in the air' which meant we were out of luck.

It cost something like $200 to get the guy to lower the car. Once it's in the air it's theirs apparently. I asked the guy how he got there so fast and he pointed up at the apartment buildings next to the empty lot and said that someone in one of the neighboring buildings just made $50 because that's the bounty if they get them in the air. Apparently multiple people every night would slip into these honeypot parking lots and the trucks just sat nearby waiting for someone to call and they'd whip right over.