What is Digg?Sponsored by Dragon Age: Origins
Can't get enough Dragon Age: Origins? Check out new footage. view!
DragonAge.BioWare.com - EA presents BioWare's new dark fantasy epic Dragon Age: Origins. '9/10' from Game Informer.
35 Comments
- pbaehr, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6At this point, why not just swipe a credit card at the meter when you pull up and let it charge you for the duration that you park there rather than constantly re-up the meter from your cell phone?
- m85476585, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6The city normally makes money off tickets, and if they offer people a way to aviod a ticket they still want to get their money.
- dmron, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7The 30 cent convenience fee sucks. I mean if you just have to pay park occasionally no biggie but if you do everyday that would add up fast. It should be illegal to have a "convenience fee" for anything. I'm looking at you, Ticketmaster.
- hooray4Zoidberg, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I just be happy if the fee was renamed. Calling it "convenience" is just insulting to me. I'd rather they be honest and call it the "just because we can and you'll pay it" fee.
- leobaby, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4We have a service here in New Orleans that lets you pay for your parking meter from any other meter in the city.
- NoteMe, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3We had this in Norway late 90's. Never took off though.
- nokkloom, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4We've had mobile parking in Estonia for years now...
but keep up the good work anyway (y) - smedrick, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3That's a good point. Seems rather unnecessary leave that extra step in there. But maybe the company is leaving in the possibility for meters to expire to appease the city. If you remove the expiration time from the equation, the city loses out on all that parking fine money.
- MoTR, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Been in Ireland for years. Is pretty commonplace, and no convenience fee.
- Philoushka, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3yay Vancouver!
A 30-cent surcharge goes to a private company. No extra revenue goes to the city. - jhunt, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Yeah, no kidding. This has been implemented in White Rock (like 45 minutes away from Vancouver) for some time now... Why is this being reported?
- aoeu, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2That was my first thought too -- well, what an _invention_. We've been using it for years.
Seems that Europe is ahead of the west ;) - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Of course! Because EVERYBODY in the world lives in Canada...
- myskja, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Well... What about:
Credit card: Swipe when parked, swipe when go.
This is in my opinion a much better solution, and it sure has made parking here in Norway much better lately. - IgogI, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1LOL, we have this in Croatia for couple of years now :) You just don't need to call, you text your plates numbers...
Long live the balkans :) - vaalaskala, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1in estonia :) years of service and everybody uses it :
1. wap your plate number (system remembers it and next time it is just one link), choose the area (you can bookamrk it and set it as shortcut)
2. set the limit or leave with default limit
3. stop it with just visiting one wap link (you can bookamrk it and set it as shortcut) - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Problem with that is someone will setup a card reader on one of these meters and someone will have their credit card info stolen
- mfearby, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I'm sure I saw these kinds of parking meters in front of the Beehive in Wellington, New Zealand, in December.
- fani, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1America - the birthplace of almost all cool modern technology will sadly never see this technology because of Bastards who run the city municipal offices especially in New York City.
Here, most meters take only quarters and you're expected to carry $5 quarters ( thats like 20 quarters ) or for 3 hr parking - $9 in quarters. Ouch !
Stupid *****.
Recently a few meters take dollar coins but seriously, how many dollar coins do you use daily ? Would it kill them to accept $1 bills or $5 bills ?
or credit cards ? or this new and convenient cell phone system. But no, the ***** who run New York city are too busy dealing with "real issues" whatever they are. Dumbdicks - asurroca, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I think we get the idea already: Basically everyone in Europe alrady has this sort of system in place.
But, who cares about wizz-bang bill-collection technology when there's a simpler approach: How about increasing the tax a little bit in order to compensate for the lost revenue and just offer free parking. Remember that, free parking? In public parking spots our which should be free to begin with? I mean, I understand paying money in a private parking garage, of course, but the idea of paying money to park in a public parking space is ludicrous.
All this is doing is allowing a third-party buzzard of a company walk in and take some of the city's revenue. - Raveren, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1>We've had mobile parking in Estonia for years now...
Lithuania too. However payed parking spaces themselves are younger here than in US - MrC539, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Pretty cool idea, although I know that in some cities it's illegal to feed your own meter after you've put the initial money in. I wonder if this rule is preventing this sort of technology from existing in certain U.S. cities.
- infinium, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I like the sophistication of their system. I hate paying for things that should be free. But, they still thought of a ton of details for their consumers. I wish other massive companies did this type of thought for things that I actually want.
- mojo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Very timely, I noticed this yesterday when I was walking around at lunch.
This is cool:
"If people use less time than they ordered, they can call to have the excess time deducted." - ZeroLogic, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The problem is, people will store cars in public spaces because its free. In my area parking is far more valuable than the coins left in the meter. In reality, at least here, it is a very little to do with city revenue and a lot more to do with keeping the parking spots available in some sort of rotation.
Yes you can store a car at a metered parking spot, but you're going to have to hire some stooge to drop coins in the meter every 4 hours or pay off all the tickets.
There are a few problems with the cellphone method that I see, first off I can't tell from the worlds crappiest photo included with the article, if the number is printed on the outside of the meter. If so, its phishin time. I can see it now, 'Press 1 or say yes to accept the charges." The second thing is, you don't have to be at the meter to make the call. So, if you were savvy enough you could have an automated method to pay the meter and ... store your cars in desirable public parking areas. Now if the meter had some sort of authentication code displayed inside on the LCD, that could work. - liquidedge, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1"Who are you drunk dialing?"
"MY PARKING METER!!!!" - HighTechGeek, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Fort Myers, Florida has it, so some places in the US are adopting it. I don't know how long ago it was implemented though...
- cell-gfx, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Add New Zealand to the list : http://www.aucklandcity.govt.nz/auckland/transport/parking/princesst.asp
- Pushkin, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Works great in Holland.
Sms the 4 digit code on the P sign to the service - when the meter maids come along, they key in your number plate - it replies that you are active so they leave you alone. You get an sms every x hours to remind you to stop the service if you have left the parking spot. - h0kiez, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I thought it was common knowledge that the US lags many parts of the world when it comes to wireless technology??? I think the quality of our wireless networks (Sprint anyone?) is a bit lagging as well.
- IgogI, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I think many people use it in Croatia, you can pay for an extra hour and you don't have to go back to your car to replace the parcking ticket...
- smegthelight, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0This is totally lame - If you read the article....
All this is about is the CITY of VANCOUVER contracting out this company to provide this pay by PHONE service for its meter head on street units.
There is nothing new or exciting - This company, and many like it, have been providing this type of service all over the entire planet for many years now. There is nothing new or exciting about it.
It just calling up some company, they take your money, and then before the meter maid issues the ticket, they call them up to see if it's been paid for. They just sprinkle a bit of technology at each step - ie Meter Maid doesn't need to use a phone or talk to a person, she uses a mobile computer that talks to a server.
SO LAME.. This has been hyped by people representing the company that makes the service as something new and exciting.
So Yes - They have been using this in Estonia for years, and Vancovuer, and New York, etc.. etc.. - cmarcus, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0My company offers a similar service, but with some major advantages:
* No "convenience fee" - you pay the normal price for your parking.
* No need to "top-up", or call for a refund on un-used time - you simply make one quick call when you arrive, then stay as long as you like - you are charged accurately for the time you spent parked, no more and no less, with a single call.
Until services like this have major consumer advantages, and minimal disadvantages (like the fee), they won't become widely adopted.
Check us out at www.sparkparking.com if you are interested - and hey, we are hiring, so perhaps you'd like to join the team that is _really_ fixing parking! - abenton, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1We've had this in our beach town for a year or so, no one ever uses it.
- FrdPrefct, on 10/12/2007, -4/+2Duplicate.
Please pay attention when submitting stories and digging them.
© Digg Inc. 2009
— Content created and posted by Digg users is