What is a Smart Parking system?

The new Smart Parking systems are today real solutions for urban mobility

Thanks to digitalization and technological evolution underway for several years, the new Smart Parking systems are today real solutions for urban mobility, in the broader scenario of the Smart City.

It is a system that, thanks to the IoT Internet of Things and sensor technology, allows us to obtain real-time data on the availability and occupancy of parking spaces, both outside and inside, and on traffic conditions. and the connected roads.

IoT technology makes it possible to detect the availability of internal and external parking spaces.

A Smart Parking system is a set of sensor devices that allows you to detect the availability of parking inside and outside.

WHY DO WE NEED SMART PARKING SYSTEMS?

By 2050, 66% of the world’s population will live in urban areas.

This trend necessarily calls for new cities’ mobility plans.

Finding parking in urban areas, both public and private, is a daily problem.

The result is an increase in air and noise pollution, fuel consumption, traffic congestion, and stress for citizens.

Already today one of the critical factors results from the estimate that over 25% of the vehicles circulating in the cities are looking for a parking space.

Implementing smart technologies to facilitate this task will solve this problem by improving operational efficiency, simplifying the flow of urban traffic, and offering drivers a more enjoyable and time-saving experience.

Also, reduce the harmful effects of congestion as fewer cars cruising equate to fewer gas emissions.

BENEFITS FOR THE COMMUNITY

So we can summarize as regards the benefits brought, that the implementation of Smart Parking solutions

Increase:

• optimization of parking in urban and private areas
• the identification of any violations
• the organized management of special car parks: areas for emergency vehicles, loading areas or cabs, car parks for the disabled, charging points for electric vehicles
• revenues generated by parking for Local Administrations up to 35%
• the positive reputation of the city and of the Green administration attentive to environmental sustainability
• the improvement of organized urban mobility
• stimulating the choice of alternative means of transport
• the offer of parking solutions with dynamic pricing strategies based on occupancy

Reduces:

• the volume of traffic: – 8/10%
• CO2 emissions and pollution in the city: – 40%
• the Km. Traveled to find the parking space: – 30%
• Time spent searching for parking: – 40%
• parking violations
• noise pollution
• fuel consumption
• anxiety or fatigue of drivers

The benefits for the community are therefore evident, but let’s see who are the actors involved in this type of installation to better understand what are the costs and what are the advantages of a smart parking system.

First, it is the Public Administrations that are involved in managing the evolution of parking systems and are the first beneficiaries of the revenues generated by the offer of parking spaces and fines for related violations.

In fact, it is they who decide on the basis of the urban mobility strategy, how many and what are the paid and free parking spaces, at what cost, and what are the durations available.

For paid parking, they usually rely on companies that provide a ticketing system and enable the parking of vehicles through the use of parking meters.

These companies are the second, in order of importance, to benefit from the implementation and use of these sensors.

Finally, there are citizens who, in order to find a parking space, often have to travel long additional journeys in the streets of the city in search of free space, wasting time, generating traffic, and polluting the air with the exhaust from their car.

SMART PARKING TECHNOLOGIES

Parking sensors, devices that interact with a software platform through data transmission and collection and analysis procedures, form the SMART PARKING system, acting as parking space occupancy detectors.

These special IoT smart parking sensors are able to detect the presence of the car and report it to the cloud control center, through a telecommunication network.

They thus indicate whether the stall is free or occupied, allowing the end user, that is, the citizen, to know in advance if he will be able to park his car in the area where he is going.

These sensors are based on different technologies, such as magnetic field measurement, infrared, ultrasound, and radar, and are often integrated into special cameras.

As always, each technology adopted has advantages and disadvantages.

An IoT system cloud-based, on the other hand, allows you to connect these devices and centralize the data that are then analyzed through big data applications to calculate in real time the availability of on-street parking or public and private parking lots.

THE ADVANTAGES OF BURIAL SENSORS IN THE INTELLIGENT PARKING

Based on our experience, one of the sensors that offer the greatest guarantees and reliability in smart parking system functions is the completely underground one, which bases the detection of the free/busy state on the variation of the earth’s magnetic field produced by the ferrous mass of the car.

The fact that the sensor is completely underground preserves its functionality, as it is not subject to vandalism and does not interfere with street cleaning or snow plows.

This type of sensor allows the road surface to be redone without interfering with its functionality.

It has no impact on the aesthetics of the streets as it is not very visible and can be used in any area of ​​the city.

Furthermore, it guarantees greater safety for pedestrians, cyclists, and motorcyclists who do not run the risk of tripping, falling, or injuring themselves.

Being battery-powered, it does not require wiring and, given its small size, installation is carried out through a simple core drilling.

Unlike the cameras, the parking sensor of this type does not record any user data allowing the protection of privacy, a very important aspect for any system that manages personal information.

Then there are particular intelligent IoT sensors which, thanks to an innovative algorithm designed and developed to detect the magnetic profile of the car, are even more reliable.

Sergio Curadi