'Tis the season to try to become better for a new year. Often it starts with little things, like squaring debts. The police in Miyagi Prefecture, however, are taking no chances. They've just announced a new strategy to force car owners with outstanding parking tickets to pay up: Cars that have been impounded as "abandoned" will be auctioned off on Yahoo.

As in most countries where automobiles are widely used, Japan struggles with the problem of where to put them when they aren't in motion. In fact, given its perennial space difficulties, it's probably more of a problem in Japan, which explains why parking violations are, administratively at least, on a par with moving violations. If you're caught illegally parking it goes down on your driving record, which is not generally the case in most other developed countries. That said, people with parking tickets seem just as likely to blow them off because the police don't always have the time or resources to pursue scofflaws.

Fines for illegal parking are ¥15,000 or ¥12,000 for a regular passenger car, depending on the place and how long the vehicle stays there. It's more for large vans and trucks (¥21,000 and ¥15,000) and less for motorcycles (¥9,000 and ¥7,000), though not as much as it is for "stopping" in traffic. If the car is towed, the violator also has to pay for the towing fee (about ¥14,000 in Tokyo) and storage costs (whatever the garage or lot happens to charge). However, according to an article in the Tokyo Shimbun, often when people show up to claim their vehicle, the operators will release it to the person even if he or she doesn't have the cash to pay. They simply send the person a bill, which few, it seems, end up paying.