Top off Your Parking Meter with a Cell Call

dstone writes "Vancouver, Canada has just become the first major city in North America to allow motorists to feed their parking meters with their cell phone. Drivers call a number on each meter, the system recognizes them by Caller ID, they enter how many minutes they want, and that's it. The system sends them a reminder text message before their time is up and they can extend their time remotely. The catch? The company contracted to provide the service, Verrus, makes their money through a 30-cent 'convenience fee.' Less pockets full of change, less parking tickets, seems like a step forward."

Comments

Wrong Number?

[Shadow Wrought]

So do you trade parking meter stickers with Lexus guy then?

Re:Wrong Number?

[Nogami_Saeko]

I think you're thinking of private lots (where this has been available for years). This is the first roll-out that covers all of the coin-meters on the sides of the street.

It seems like a good idea, however the cynical side of me also wonders that if in addition text messaging the owner of the vehicle when the payment is about to expire, it might also be text messaging the parking enforcement officer for the area to keep an eye out in areas with lots of meters that are expiring at the same time so they know where to concentrate their "efforts"...

It would also be nice if they could do this as a straight text message by phone instead of by voice. Could be a lot faster...

N.

Re:Wrong Number?

[fireboy1919]

lots of meters that are expiring at the same time so they know where to concentrate their "efforts"

So then...I can play "make the cops run around" by just getting a bunch of my friends on opposite sides of the street to buy only 15 minutes at a time and renew within the last 7 seconds?

Kinda defeats a parking meter feature

[OYAHHH]

If,

I'm not way off-track one of the purposes of a parking meter is the annoyance feature. Keeps a set of rich guys from pumping quarters in it all day long without any negative consequences for them.

This tech enables that sort of behavior.

And then the poor slobs get to walk a half a mile just to get to the courthouse.....

Re:Kinda defeats a parking meter feature

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, here in Calgary CANADA, there's been a big hubub recently about people parking all day at parking meters and just paying the fine. It was cheaper to pay the $25 fine than to pay $28 for eight hours of parking.
Apparently a secretary for couple of law offices would regularily just walk into city hall with a list of license numbers of the partners and pay off all the fines on-masse

City of Calgary is considering raising the daily fine to $300 now

Re:Kinda defeats a parking meter feature

[danzona]

Here in Chicago, most parking meters have a time limit for parking. So it will say 25c / 30 minutes, 2 hour limit.

In Chicago, it appears that enforcement of this is half hearted (compared with places like Carmel where they use chalk to mark the tires to enforce the time limit).

Anyway, it would not be hard for the cell phone parking meter to enforce the time limit. So after 4 quarters, the parking meter won't take any more money and the driver has to move.

Wouldn't it be great if the parking meter could tell that you hadn't paid or moved the car and then issued the cell phone an instant meter violation charge? I believe that is $50 in Chicago. Plus a 30 cent convenience fee.

Re:Kinda defeats a parking meter feature

[jelloshotgun]

It's still $15 in Brookline.

Re:Kinda defeats a parking meter feature

[Chosen Reject]

Grocery store! You lazy slob. Grow your own wheat.

Re:Kinda defeats a parking meter feature

[riflemann]

They have a solution to this in many European cities:

Wheelclamps.

To Mr RichBastard, paying a fine is no deterrent. Mr RichBastard having to wait an hour or two for the guys with the wheel clamp keys is gonna re-think his parking strategy.

Especially when they (purposely) take their time coming to unclamp you.

Re:Kinda defeats a parking meter feature

[toleraen]

the laws are becoming more and more rigid (mandatory life sentences, etc).

You're blaming the freakin' meter maid for mandatory life sentences?! While I agree that the police might be given more rights than they should, you're talking about the person that's hired to make sure your dumbass is fairly paying for general road repairs! What, do you blame the janitor for having to wash your hands after taking a crap at work?

Re:Kinda defeats a parking meter feature

[really?]

There is some law against damaging them things.

Now, depending on the "boot" and on your wheels, there are other ways. My brother, has a BUNCH of booths - as in more than 20 - in a corner of his yard. He drives a Nissan SUV with BIG ass off road tyres. If he returns to his car and finds it "booted", he lets the air out of the tyre, and bends a small piece of the booth. He then removes the boot, bends back the small piece, re-inflates the tire with a small electric pump he always has in the back, throws the boot in his car and drives away. I asked him why he didn't just leave the boot behind, and he said "I wouldn't want anyone to take it and sell it for scrap metal." Once every few months he loads all the boots in his car and "dumps" them at the gate of one the smaller police stations in the town, since in the country he lives in right now it's the cops that put the boots on. He thinks this is funny.

"Convenience" fees! Heh.

[ScentCone]

I remember the first time (too many years back, now) that I experienced Convenience while I was in line at a McDonalds grabbing a burger on my way someplace. I told the cashier I wanted a Diet Coke as my combo drink. She handed me the now-expected empty cup and told me that I would be getting the drink from the "Convenience Center" across the store.

"Convenient for who?" I asked. And she told me, unblinkingly, that it had in fact really made their job a lot easier.

Re:"Convenience" fees! Heh.

[Irish_Samurai]

Don't claim you're anti-establishment as some sort of justification of your con jobs. Your actions are the ones driving companies to do the shit they do.

Choose your payment method:

[telso]

To use a washer, text the word "SLUG" to 91111.

Scare quotes

[kevin_conaway]

Why the scare quotes around convenience fees? Is the submitter implying that the cell phone company should graciously provide this service for free? Or perhaps the fee isn't really a fee?

Either way, editorializing in the summary is silly.

Re:Scare quotes

[bunions]

being able to put more time on your parking meter without running out to the curb in the rain sounds pretty fucking convenient to me. I pay a fee for convenience. Therefore it is a convenience fee. I don't see how this is confusing for anyone.

Meter stuffingt = bad

[dotmax]

In a lot of [U.S.] cities, running out to stuff another wad of quarters in the meter will get you a ticket, the concept being that metered parking is temporary parking. Curbside metered parking is designed for people who are going to get-in/get-out. If you're going to be somewhere all day you should either be using a parking garage or alternate transportation. In theory.

This scheme seems like a bullshit technological antisolution that would only make the current street parking situation worse,

Uh huh. Except...

[penguinstorm]

1) It bills to your credit card
2) I don't have a credit card
3) I don't like The Man tracking my activities, right down to where and when I park

Just a thought.

It's about the money

[ezratrumpet]

The Man probably doesn't care about temporary parking vs. garage parking. If anything, the Man will encourage more use of temporary (aka parking meter) parking. Meters, when in use, make more money than parking garages. If the Man can keep the metered spaces full, it means more money for governmental projects.

Assistance Required

[Aqua_boy17]

...feed their parking meters with their cell phone

I'd like to try this, but I can't seem to fit my phone into the coin slot. Maybe if I bought a Razr?