More little yellow envelopes are being stuffed under car wiper blades in Kent this year compared with last year.

Through April this year, Kent has issued a total of 1,125 parking tickets compared with 1,071 citations issued during the same period in 2011, according to the Kent Police Department.

That's a difference of 54 tickets, or an increase of 5 percent.

The reasons for the increase are hard to pin down, and whether or not road closures for construction and the construction workers — who must find a place to park downtown all day — contributed to the increase so far is hard to say.

And even though tickets are on the rise so far this year that doesn't mean Kent is necessarily issuing more tickets than previous years. In fact, 2011 saw fewer parking tickets issued than the previous two years.

The number of tickets issued per month breaks down as follows:

The number of tickets issued in the past three years:

There may be some relief in sight for drivers struggling to find a place to park, as more than 100 parking spaces will be added in the middle of the city's redevelopment block, the new Kent Municipal Courthouse will add parking on East Main Street and the PARTA Kent Central Gateway transit center will include more than 300 parking spaces.