Only in San Francisco: Supply and Demand-Priced Parking Meters - The UpStream

Only in San Francisco: Supply and Demand-Priced Parking Meters

posted Sunday Aug 8, 2010 by Nicholas DiMeo

Only in San Francisco: Supply and Demand-Priced Parking Meters

Circling for parking accounts for approximately 30% of city driving. Reducing this traffic by helping drivers find parking benefits everyone. More parking availability makes streets less congested and safer. Meters that accept credit cards reduce frustration and the need for parking citations. With SFpark: Circle Less, Live More.

Only in San Fransisco can a quirky, yet possibly effective idea like this get off the ground and work! San Fransisco's parking is a disaster, so to counter, they are looking for solutions that will allow at least one parking spot open per block. With SFpark, they hope to achieve this crazy result! How? By using real-time data and demand-responsive pricing to readjust parking patterns.

Follow the break for more information.

Once a month, data will be collected, measured and analyzed to determine which prices will need to go up, and which prices on meters will need to go down. Parking meter pricing can be anywhere from 25 cents to $6 an hour, depending on how many and how popular certain areas are. Users will be able to pay via coin as usual, but can also use their transit card or debit/credit cards as well for an added convenience.

This is like one of those Flash-based house-flipping games. Supply and demand-based pricing on parking meters? It does have potential though, and it is being well received in the current test markets of 6,000 metered spaces and the city hopes to expand to its full 25,000 spaces in two years.

Is this nuts or a good idea? What do you guys think? Just as a side note, the Overview video on their site is probably the reason some spots will be $6/hr.

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