Parking Meters Get Stingier, More Convenient

In this seaside town in Northern California, parking meters don’t grant those magical few minutes on someone else’s dime. Each time a car pulls away from a space, the meter automatically resets to zero.

Little is left to chance in the brave new world of parking technology: Meters are triggered by remote sensors, customers pay for street time by cellphone and solar-powered vending machines create customized parking plans for motorists.

Oh, and forget about rubbing the traffic officer’s chalk mark off your tires on the streets of cities where short-term parking is free but overstays are punished by fines.

If you’re in Monterey or Chicago, you’re apt to be foiled by parking enforcement vehicles outfitted with GPS-enabled cameras that scan your license plate, letting the driver know how long you have occupied the space.

Meters that accept only coins have long been disappearing from such major metropolises as New York and Toronto, and smaller cities including Aspen, Colo., and Savannah, Ga., have now ditched them too.

Advanced parking technologies can lower a city’s operating costs, reduce staffing needs and increase ticketing accuracy, resulting in fewer challenges in traffic court. Bill Francis, a vice president at Los Angeles-based Walker Parking Consultants, says technology can also help local officials more smoothly collect on outstanding tickets.

Pacific Grove, a coastal resort town where visitors to the Monterey Bay Aquarium and Pebble Beach golf course compete with locals for the few oceanside spaces, went for the gold when it went digital last year.

It installed meters that increase parking fees over time, so that quick errands remain relatively inexpensive but long stays become more costly.

A wire grid under the pavement triggers a sensor whenever a car pulls in. The information can be sent wirelessly via radio signals to traffic enforcers so they know when time runs out on any parking spot in town. The meter resets itself as soon as the car pulls away, so the next car has to pay the full fee.

“Today’s meters are little computers,” said Ross Hubbard, a former Pacific Grove city manager who advocated for the switch. The city leases 100 meters for $45,000 a year from Duncan Parking Technologies Inc., based in Harrison, Ark.

After examining the data, the council realized it could bring in still more revenue by shifting the enforcement schedule to include Saturday afternoons, “when the likelihood of nabbing people is statistically much higher,” Hubbard said.

The official enthusiasm isn’t shared by all drivers in Pacific Grove.

Sue Shenkman said she wasn’t happy about shelling out $4 to keep her spot for a fifth hour after spending $1 for each of the first two hours and $2 for each of the next two.

But she really wanted her son to see the aquarium.

“At home, we’re always trying to get someone else’s meter that has a little time on it,” said Shenkman, who was visiting from Boston.

For Officer Tony Marino, it’s a question of changing attitudes, showing people the benefits of a system that can no longer be gamed.

“I just wish people would go with the flow,” said Marino, whose three-wheeled cart is the center of the town’s enforcement operation. “I mean, a parking meter is like a restaurant table: We have to turn these things over.”

In Sacramento, officials have solved the turnover problem by booting cars that repeatedly overstay their street time. There, officers drive around in carts made by Montreal-based AutoVu Technologies Inc. that take infrared pictures of license plates. That program and efforts to collect on unpaid tickets have increased revenue by more than $300,000 in the last year, said Howard Chan, who runs Sacramento’s parking division.

Not all the meter technology is aimed at better enforcement.

Convenience is the mantra in Coral Gables, Fla., where residents have quickly learned to feed meters by cellphone, using a system made by Toronto-based Mint Technology Corp.

After registering online, giving credit card information and getting a user ID, subscribers can dial an 800 number and punch in the code assigned to their meter. Their cost for each “parking session” plus a $7 monthly fee is billed directly online.

And Sacramento is piloting three solar-powered multispace meters that can be configured to accept coins, credit cards, bills and stored-value smart cards, allowing motorists to pay for the time they wish to stay without being restricted to the change in their pockets.

But local governments considering upgrades still need to do their research.

Chris Quick, the lead parking officer in Palo Alto, said the city decided against buying carts similar to Sacramento’s four years ago because at the time the infrared cameras appeared to have wandering eyes.

“On rainy days especially, for whatever warped reason, the device seemed to like to take pictures of trees,” Quick said.

Instead, the city bought hand-held devices that can tell whether a car has been in the same spot for too long. Officers manually enter license plate numbers and return an hour or two later to reenter the plates. When the machine gets a match, the officer can issue a parking ticket.

Louise Gilman figured she had spent $600 a year on parking tickets because she didn’t like to move her car from a shady two-hour spot near her office in downtown Palo Alto.

Gilman said she couldn’t figure out how they caught her, because she went out every few hours to check whether the police had chalked her tires. She hadn’t heard about the hand-held gadgets.

“You’re sitting there saying, ‘I know I just went out there and looked for chalk. How could I have been ticketed?’ ” Gilman said. “They’re very sneaky.”