The era of Smart Parking has only just begun, however the technology and software needed to make parking more efficient is currently being installed worldwide. As a result, owners of parking garages, lots, and areas with street parking are taking steps to transform these outdated locations into Smart Parking Facilities.
“Experts now believe that the fully connected ‘smart parking garage’ will be [universal] within the next 10 years,” said Philip Russo, Founding Partner of MetaProp Advisors, a group keeping track of parking garage technology and the effects its advancement has on real estate. “The effect on the approximately 40,000 garages… in the U.S., along with the other international facilities, will come from the traditional car makers… but also from technology-oriented companies… along with some… GarageTech startups.”
Even small startup companies like Kyosis Parking Technologies have created impact. The technology Kyosis distributes comes from a wide range of manufacturers and has been installed in more than 2,800 locations, monitored in more than 1.7 million spaces, and is in 50 countries collectively, according to CEO and Founder, Rupesh Patel.
As parking facilities across the board begin to automate, so too will the vehicles using these areas. Autonomous autos have yet to become mainstream (similar to Smart Parking systems) but, as they are adopted the new vehicle tech and smart parking systems will begin to interface.
Already, manufacturers like Jaguar, Mercedes, Ford, Tesla, as well as other have invested in autonomous vehicles that have self-parking features. Furthermore, smarter car parks that cater to smarter vehicles have started to emerge.
Audi, who currently sells a self-parking vehicle touted as one of the best of its kind, has begun to plan an autonomous parking location in Somerville, Massachussetts. The automobile builder will deploy a portion of cars to test how its piloted parking technology cooperates with a parking garage designed specifically for autonomous vehicles, according to WIRED.
In Boulder, Colorado, ParkPlus is working on a fully, autonomous parking garage that will employ car-scanning, laser sensors and a robotic dolly that lifts and transfers the vehicles to vertical storage racks.
Finally, Jaguar Land Rover is currently testing vehicles that can “valet” themselves. The program has begun about an hour north of London, UK in a town called Milton Keynes. The masterminds behind this technology say that scanning sensors on the vehicle allow for vehicle-to-vehicle communications—meaning the cars are able to “talk” to each other and the surrounding environment.
While much of this technology is in the testing phase, a lot of the technology, software, and infrastructure needed to make it happen has already been established. It is not long until a driver will be able to step out of a vehicle before entering a parking facility and call that vehicle back out of the facility as needed.
Check back with our parking blog a couple times every month to hear the latest in parking industry news!