1. Connected Single Spot Parking Barriers
A) Premise – Public parking spaces in crowded commercial areas are best used in the following ways
- Free parking for the first 30 mins to 2 hr. (based on multiple factors like vehicle density, crowd and time of the day which determines parking demand) followed by paid parking with incremental charges by the hour.
- Reserved parking for senior citizens and people with disability ensuring that there struggles are not increased. This should also follow the model in point 1 with different time restrictions based demand
- Premium parking if a user is ready to forgo free parking time, books early and is ready to pay more
B) Equipment – Single spot parking barriers operable through a web/mobile app. Image 1 shows few samples of currently available units for domestic/small enterprise use. Image 2 shows a sample of how a connected bookable barrier will look like.
The barrier should ideally have all the following features:
- Sturdy and fixable on the ground; should be difficult to tamper with
- Takes minimal space under the car when down with a steady connection to power and internet.
- Camera / Sensor to auto up when the car moves away after parking
- Bright display / board to let the person who booked to easily identify the spot and let others know how to book
- Camera to detect and auto down based on number plate
C) Workflow
Below is a high level end to end workflow of how a parking service using connected single space barriers can work.
D) App Wireframe
Below are 6 low fidelity wireframes covering the major aspects of the workflow mentioned above.
E) Minimum Viable Product
This service can be launched with a bare minimum of the following to understand market acceptability and customer behavior towards the same:
- A simple booking and parking executive app based on which all bookings are manually handled at the spot
- Remote controlled parking barriers operatable by the executive similar to this – https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/U-Shape-Carport-Remote-Control-Parking_60675313400.html?spm=a2700.7724838.2017115.72.41ae253aDFtILU
- Payment through parking executives
F)Market
G)Launch
G) The Math
2. Anywhere Valet
A) Premise – Any time spend upwards of 15 – 30 mins to find parking and walk from the parking to the desired destination might not justify taking the car out.