Tow truck on the Inman Avenue side of Rahway, NJ: Lawrence Street, the hospital and the Colonia line

Shift-change no-starts, visitor lockouts and staff cars that sat through a double. Security lets the truck in once you have called. Keys locked in a car at the hospital are a one-price lockout with damage-free tools; a car that must leave goes on whichever truck its drivetrain requires.

Inman Avenue crosses into Colonia and the mechanics on the Woodbridge side are as familiar to these streets as the ones on St. Georges Avenue. A tow over the line is the booking fee plus a mile or two.

Say which side of the line the car is on; the truck comes the same way either way.

Older houses with single-car garages a flatbed cannot back to and a car that has not moved in months. The driver winches it out to the street on skates or dollies, lays blocks under the ramp for a low nose, and loads at the curb.

Madison Hill Road climbs toward Clark and freezes early; a slide-off there is a winch quoted first.

Half of them cross into Woodbridge Township for a shop in Colonia or Avenel, the other half head up to St. Georges Avenue or over to Clark. All of it is a handful of miles, and the mileage line is small.

From here our yard in Linden is about ten minutes by St. Georges Avenue, and a truck already in Rahway is usually closer.