If you’re frustrated about having to use multiple systems to manage your parking availability, guidance, safety and security, access control and vehicle routing—read on. In this post, we’ll talk about what your parking management system can look like today by leveraging an open platform, and show you all that one single parking management system can do for you.

How the IoT Changed Parking Forever

Historically, parking systems were hardware-driven. Whether it was single-slot meters, parking lot access or counting systems, everything was very “closed-architecture”.  No system really talked to another system, so you accessed each one separately—one at a time—and there was no way of connecting any of that information.

About ten to 15 years ago, there started to develop a trend to try to fix that. That trend is the Internet of Things, or IoT for short. IoT essentially means that any device that can connect to the Internet has the ability to capture data, whether it’s your phone, a parking meter or a parking garage gate. We slowly started to see a shift to flexible software mobile solutions, but the key is that they are accessible to the Internet. By being accessible to the Internet, they have the ability to capture and record data so that they can keep it and analyze it over time.

With an IoT-driven, open architecture parking system you can tie all your legacy systems together onto a single, easy-to-use platform that delivers a superior parking experience for parkers, operators and the community.

ParkingCloud™

The ParkingCloud parking management system from All Traffic Solutions uses this open technology for counting, guidance, safety and analytics. ParkingCloud is the only cloud-based IoT platform purpose-built for the parking and transportation industry that integrates all your devices, data, signs and output in one place. With ParkingCloud as your single parking management platform, you no longer have to access each system separately, and you can report on data from all your systems together to give you a holistic view of your entire parking operation.

Let’s take a look at all ParkingCloud can do.

Citywide parking availability gives drivers heads-up parking guidance so they know where to find parking, whether in lots, in garages or metered parking on the street.

Open architecture allows integration with your legacy parking investment so you can continue to use the systems you already have, and can purchase additional systems regardless of what technologies they use without being tied to one vendor.

Provide parking guidance by lot or garage, level or space, including premium spaces. For example, as parkers enter your parking facility, they see a sign informing them of the number of available open spaces—as well as handicapped spaces, visitor spaces, expectant mother spaces—on each level.

Safety measures in and around parking facilities to protect drivers and pedestrians. These measures can include radar speed displays with conditional messaging that tell speeding drivers to slow down and camera-based counting solutions.

Conditional messaging using web-enabled variable message signs directs inbound parkers to facilities with availability (PARKING AT SPRING ST NEXT LEFT), and exiting parkers to less congested routes on entry roads (ACCIDENT ON RT 267– TAKE ALT. ROUTE). Reduces congestion in and around parking areas.

Traffic is routed out of facilities on the fastest routes via heads-up roadside messages. You can even program current travel times to multiple routes and have them automatically update as conditions change.

Access control using license plate recognition, Bluetooth or RFID to help maintain the flow of traffic in commercial and non-commercial facilities.

Trucks are routed to available parking based on remaining drive time hours via their logbook to reduce congestion and idling time (and truck emissions!).

Data and reports are available on demand to help you manage real-time routing and guidance, as well as influence long-term planning. You can run and download the reports in seconds, as well as set up email subscriptions so you (and others if you choose) receive specific reports on an ongoing basis.

Availability data via real-time access for audit and loss control, trend analysis and parker classification.

Open Platform Parking Management is a Game-Changer

When you use the best of the new technologies to optimize parking availability, safety and guidance, the result is a much healthier parking environment. You allow people to get where they need to be faster with no hassle, and you improve the parking experience for everyone. Parking is simpler to manage, more cost-effective and more profitable for your organization.

ParkingCloud does all this:

–Gives you a single view of your entire parking ecosystem
–Allows you to future-proof your investment with an open, extensible platform
–Accommodates your existing infrastructure
–Leverages cloud-based SaaS and PaaS economies so you don’t have to build your own customized solution

Download more information about what parking looks like in 2018.

Visit our smart parking solutions page.

Contact us today to speak with a parking solutions expert.