In this week's Mercury, I led a story about Old Town's nascent "entertainment zone" with a stirring and original metaphor: tow trucks as wolves!

But I was unable to get a hard number, before deadline, on just how many cars were towed from the district. I now have that number: 315.

That's 315 bewildered and enraged oaths to heaven by folks who didn't notice the area was a tow-away zone from 10 pm to 3 am on Fridays and Saturdays. In February, tow trucks were legion, snaking through barricades and absconding with nearly 50 cars some weekends.

That activity was worrisome to some of the neighborhood's bars, which feared the enforcement would alienate customers. It was also, apparently, largely the result of hard-to-notice signage. In March, the district was lined with sandwich boards announcing the closures, after which towing tapered off.

It's unclear right now how much money the city recouped from the tows. The Portland Bureau of Transportation spent almost $30,000 over the course of the pilot project on parking enforcement and street closures.

Here's the info the Portland Police Bureau sent along this morning:

tows.jpg