OFF THE WIRE
www.traffictechnologytoday.com/news.php?NewsID=20600 Los Angeles and San Francisco to introduce price-variable smart parking projects
Two of California's largest cities are introducing experimental 'smart parking' schemes that will use the latest interactive technologies to inform motorists where spaces are available and at what price. San Francisco and Los Angeles are beginning two-year pilot projects that will use supply-and-demand principles in order to determine parking prices, with the assistance of wireless technology. Both cities are installing sensors in parking spaces in areas selected by their high usage. The sensors will give real-time digital information about whether a space is occupied and for how long.
The systems are designed to recommend a parking price increase if a given block, at a given time, is filled with parked cars. The idea is to set the pricing at a level that will keep 10% to 30% of spaces in a given area vacant, which is intended to curb the fuel usage caused by motorists circling city blocks looking for vacant spaces. San Francisco began installing sensors in pilot project areas in January in preparation for a summer launch. By then, the sensors will be wired into an integrated system and real-time data directed to a web portal for drivers to log into. The pilot project is funded by a federal grant of US$24.75 million, which will pay for parking sensors, new meters and stations, variable message signs (VMS), computer systems and servers to store data.
SFPark - which is part of the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency - will apply the pilot to about 6,000 of the city's 25,000 metered parking spaces. About 1,500 spaces in peak, tow-away zones will have magnetometer sensors embedded, flush with the pavement, while other sensors will be epoxied onto the surface of the parking space. The web portal will display the number of spaces available in a given block and later in the project the data will be used to create parking advisories transmitted on electronic VMS in those areas.
In Los Angeles, the LA ExpressPark Project is expected to start circulating real-time data in 2011. It is tied in to a larger transit improvement plan to create high-occupancy toll lanes in freeways cutting through downtown. ExpressPark, estimated at US$15 million, is one of 16 initiatives contained in a US$210.6 million federal congestion reduction grant submitted by LADOT, Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority and Caltrans. The pilot project applies to about 5,500 spaces of Los Angeles' 40,000 metered parking spaces. In early returns of some of the new machines on test, LADOT is finding that an estimated 50% of parkers are using bank and credit cards, but few parkers were taking advantage of the capability to pay by cell phone for a small fee.
30 March 2010
