Got Parking?

Posted by Sheila Redick on April 11, 2006

A recent article in the Wall Street Journal highlights a growing trend in cities: using technology to help motorists find and reserve parking in advance using computers and cell phones.

A number of services - from private companies to public transit systems - are using new technology to make it easier for customers and commuters to park in busy urban areas.

Some examples include:

The Bay Area Rapid Transit system in California is testing availability and reservation technology from Acme Innovation Inc. at the Rockridge BART train station in Oakland, where commuters park their cars before taking the train into San Francisco. The "ParkingCarma" service broadcasts on signs along a nearby highway how many of a limited number of parking spots are open, based on sensor chips embedded in the lot, and allows commuters to check availability and reserve the spaces by phone or online. Early next year, BART plans to expand the technology to more stations.

Pittsburgh's Downtown Partnership offers online or phone parking reservations in eight downtown parking garages.  Doctors and dentists are  promoting the service to their patients in the area.

MobileParking LLC has a service in which users call 800-PARK-123 to check parking availability and reserve spots at roughly 400 parking facilities in Baltimore, Chicago, New York and Philadelphia, among other cities.

XM Satellite Radio, which already provides real-time traffic information to navigation devices, demonstrated a potential service called "Dynamic Parking Information" last November. The percentage of spaces available at certain parking facilities was represented on navigation-system maps using colored icons. The actual number of spaces available also was depicted.

This spring SpotScout Inc. plans to launch a parking-reservation service in Boston and New York through which people looking for spots would log on through Web-enabled cellphones to search for and reserve spots offered by garages and private individuals.