Low cost free flow parking camera for massive deployment: PARCAM

Parking space management is critical in modern societies. This valuable resource must be managed such that the needs of both community inhabitants, commuters and local businesses are met. Parking space management is also essential in the implementation of community policies related to circulation, use of public transport and pollution. One obvious bottleneck in their use is the entering and leaving of the parking facilities. This requires a number of steps such as obtaining a ticket, passing boom gates a nd paying at a pay station. This is time consuming, user unfriendly and requires large amounts of expensive and maintenance intensive equipment. An alternative to this paradigm is the use of cameras that identify cars entering and leaving a parking faci lity based on reading their license plates. With this paradigm, parking becomes barrier free. This is very user friendly, efficient and removes the need for space consuming expensive hardware such as payment machines and gating solutions. The aim of the overall project is the development of a high quality, easily installable license plate reading camera with a very low cost. This will enable a business model based on providing the required cameras to parking house operators free of charge thus facilitati ng market acceptance. Revenue comes from a per-parking transaction fee. This is challenging for several reasons: 1) The reading of the license plates is difficult. Lumex Traffic Solutions AS has developed a license plate reading software that will be bundled with the camera. This software will be further developed and adapted to use in the parking scenario. 2) Making the license plate reading camera at an acceptably low price point is very challenging. We aim at making a camera that requires a minim um of installation, basically only local power is needed. This is an additional complication. 3) Finally, we need to develop the supporting business model and anchor it with end users.