Sunday, July 23, 2017

IoT-Assisted Parking Will See Winners and Losers

As with any other important economic change, internet of things will have winners and losers. Consider only the matter of parking costs. As that process becomes more efficient, consumers will pay less. But that also means sellers of parking spots and gasoline, to name a couple of examples, will earn less money.

Some retailers might incrementally gain store traffic, while online alternatives might incrementally lose a bit.

INRIX today published a major new study combining data from the INRIX Parking database of 100,000 locations across 8,700 cities in more than 100 countries, with results from a recent survey of nearly 18,000 drivers in the U.S., U.K. and Germany, including close to 6,000 across 10 U.S. cities.

On average, U.S. drivers spend 17 hours per year searching for parking at a cost of $345 per driver in wasted time, fuel and emissions, according to a study by Inrix.

On average, drivers in New York City spend 107 hours per year searching for a parking spot at a cost $2,243 per driver in wasted time, fuel and emissions, amounting to $4.3 billion in costs to the city as a whole.

Los Angeles drivers trailed New York with the most painful parking experience (85 hours – $1,785), followed by San Francisco (83 hours – $1,735), Washington D.C. (65 hours – $1,367), Seattle (58 hours – $1,205), Chicago (56 hours – $1,174), Boston (53 hours – $1,111), Atlanta (50 hours – $1,043), Dallas (48 hours – $995) and Detroit (35 hours – $731).

Hours Spent Searching for Parking
table 1

U.S. drivers also routinely pay for more parking, “just in case,” in the same way they buy mobile data plans larger than consumers expect to require, to avoid overage charges.

In the U.S., drivers add an average of 13 hours per year when they pay for parking. The cost of overpaying for parking amounts to more than $20 billion annually, on a national basis.

Drivers in New York City add the most extra time when paying for parking, averaging 96 hours a year, or an extra $896 in parking payments.

Extra Time for Parking Sessions and Parking Fines
table 2

Of the 6,000 U.S. drivers who responded to the survey, an alarming 63 percent reported they avoided driving to a destination due to the challenge of find parking.

Some 39 percent of respondents avoided shopping destinations because of the lack of parking, 27 percent didn’t drive to airports, 26 percent skipped leisure/sports activities and 21 percent avoided commuting to work. Some  20 percent of U.S.  motorists surveyed did not drive to the doctor’s office or hospital due to parking issues.

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