we have those machines here in metuchen and growing up we had them in brooklyn, new york. that's why there's opposite sides of the street parking in new york city boroughs.
EDIT TO ADD: oooh, ooooh! when i was little, we had street sweepers that sprayed out water as they went so that they actually washed the streets. everything got washed down the storm sewers. we floated little bits of paper, called 'boats' on the little 'rivers' up against the curbs. who knew? we had never seen a boat or a river during the war.