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Integrated Parking Spot Analyzer

No parking except when parking is allowed, except when it's not
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Particularly in urban areas, street parking restrictions can be incredibly confusing. For example, on the street outside where I live, the multitude of signs posted collectively indicate something along the lines of "No parking except by permit, except for two hours between 8AM and 6PM on weekdays (including holidays), except on street cleaning days when no parking is permitted at all between 8AM and 11AM on THIS side of the street (except on holidays)." Needless to say, parking enforcement officers regularly patrol the area like sharks aroused by the smell of chum, looking to hand out citations to anybody who fails to adequately comprehend this morass of regulations. And yet, this is one of the least complicated sets of parking restrictions you're likely to encounter in this city. To add insult to injury, in many cases failing to comply with posted parking restrictions, even by a few minutes, results in your car not only being cited, but towed as well.

Nowadays, however, many cars have GPS navigation, which often knows such nice things as what the speed limit is on the road you're currently on. Similar information could be collected as to parking regulations, such that your car could simply tell you whether you're allowed to park wherever it is you currently are, and for how long. A compass reading could be used to help determine which side of the street you've parked on, in case the GPS isn't quite accurate enough. By integrating the parking system with a wireless network, as more and more cars seem to be capable of, your car could even alert you remotely when you're about to run out of time in the spot you've parked in, or if you've forgotten to move your car for street cleaning this week.

ytk, Nov 15 2011

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       Reduction in revenue from fines to the local authority = will never be implemented.
pocmloc, Nov 15 2011
  

       [pocmloc] the system is in the car, so you don't need cooperation from the city. Parking regulations could be uploaded by users to build the database. I like it, you could combine it with Honda's augmented reality system to make safe parking spots turn green and all others turn red while driving by them.
DIYMatt, Nov 15 2011
  

       If regulations were uploaded by users, this would have potential for abuse: A user wishing to "save" a spot could post "watch out, they tow your car away even though no sign is posted" and it would scare everyone else away from parking there.
phundug, Nov 15 2011
  

       My guess is in the majority of cities the entire set of parking restrictions is obtainable without too much difficulty. Certainly information such as street cleaning routes and permit parking restrictions must be documented for the city's use, and many cities even post this information online. As to the rest of the regulations, they surely are documented somewhere, and the city can hardly make a legitimate claim that they have an interest in withholding what is clearly a matter of public record.
ytk, Nov 15 2011
  
      
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