No More Aimless Searching For Parking Spots

San Francisco is testing out a wireless network that will tell motorists where available parking spots are located. Small sensors detect if the parking space is empty or occupied, and sends the information to either street signs or to your mobile phone. Based on your location, the system will show you a map of nearby free spaces. The goal is to cut down or eliminate cars cruising around searching for a spot. It’s a good thing too. Two studies in New York and Los Angeles have shown that all that searching is creating lots of unnecessary traffic and wasted fuel.

The New York Times reports:

Not that New Yorkers need any reminders of their traffic problems, but a study released in June by Transportation Alternatives, a public transit advocacy group, reported that 28 percent to 45 percent of traffic on some streets in New York City is generated by people circling the blocks.

The study also said that drivers searching for metered parking in just a 15-block area of Columbus Avenue on Manhattan’s Upper West Side drove 366,000 miles a year.

…

In one small Los Angeles business district that he studied over the course of a year, cars cruising for parking created the equivalent of 38 trips around the world, burning 47,000 gallons of gasoline and producing 730 tons of carbon dioxide.

NYT: “Can’t Find a Parking Spot? Check Smartphone” (Reg. required)

[via Gawker]