Here come the parking apps!

Many mobile apps are designed specifically for parking, bypassing the web altogether. Several of these apps show the potential to impact parking in the future:

New Pay-by-Cell (Pay-by-Phone) apps are better than their old text-message counterparts. As an app the pay-by-phone functionality is more streamlined and provides new options to parkers. These options can include choosing a vehicle from an account list, keeping a credit card on file, or identifying a location/zone by GPS position, QR barcode, or NFC tag rather than typing a location code number.
Various “remember my parking space” apps enable a parker to record the GPS location when parking, including optional attached photos or notes-to-self. Later, when returning to the car you ask the app “where did I park?” The app then responds with a map overlay showing the car, the photo, and the audio clip. Some will also tell you the direction and distance between your current location and your vehicle, and it may even give you step-by-step walking directions!
Payment apps from Visa, MasterCard, PayPal, and a whole host of start-up companies like Obopay and Zong (now owned by PayPal/eBay) are making it easier to one-click-pay for things using a mobile phone app – these things will eventually include parking. The phone provides the ability to protect the transaction with a password (PIN) for more security, and some new phones also support Near Field Communication (NFC) chips (rumored to be on the iPhone 5), further automating the payment process.
“Parker” is a mobile app that guides parkers to available on-street spaces where Streetline sensors have been installed. The sensors provide feedback to a central server, which in turn “exposes” this data to users of the mobile app.
Bought one of those newfangled electric vehicles? The Nissan Leaf, Chevy Volt, and Ford Focus EV all have available apps to tell you how to find public chargers or – in some cases – how much longer it will take to charge. (Bill Ford, Executive Chairman of Ford Motor Company, has been heavily marketing these in-vehicle “apps” as avenues to reduce unnecessary fuel usage and exhaust emissions. Of course, hunting for parking spaces is a big source of preventable fuel consumption, and Ford is banking on it, literally!)