-
Intelligent parking system
Abstract
The
basic concepts of the parking reservation system
and parking revenue management system
are discussed in this
paper. The
proposed intelligent’’ parking space inventory
control system that is based on a
combination of fuzzy
logic and integer
programming techniques makes ‘‘on
line’’ decisions whether to accept or
reject a new
driver's request for
parking. In the
?
rst step of
the
proposed model, the best parking
strategies are developed
for many
different patterns of vehicle arrivals. These
parking strategies are developed using
integer programming
approach. In the
second step, learn-ing from the best
strategies,
speci
?
c rules are
de
?
ned. The uniqueness of
the
proposed approach is that the rules
are derived from the
set of chosen
examples assuming that the future traffic
arrival patterns are known. The results
were found to be
close to the best
solution assuming that the future arrival
pattern is known.b5E2RGbCAP
Keywords:
Traffic
。
Uncertainty
modeling
。
Control
。
Parking
。
Fuzzy
logicp1EanqFDPw
1.
Introduction
Every day a
signi
?
cant percentage of
drivers in single-
occupancy vehicles
search for a parking space. Additionally,
less
experienced
drivers
or
out-
of-towners
further
contribute
to
the
increase
of
traffic
congestion.
Search
for a vacant parking
space is a typical example of a search
process. Every parking search strategy
is composed of a set
of
vague
rules.
It
is
usually
difficult
to
describe
these
rules explicitly. The type of the
planned activity, time of
a
day,
day
of
the
week,
current
congestion
on
particular
routes,
knowledge
of
city
streets,
and
potentially
available
parking
places
have
signi
?
cant
in
?
uence
on
a
chosen
parking
search
strategy.
During
the
last
four
decades numerous parking search models
have been
developed
(Vander
Goot, 1982
。
Axhausen and
Polak, 1991
。
Polak and
Axhausen, 1990
。
Young et al., 1991a,b
。
saltzman, 1997
。
Shoup,
1997
。
Steiner,
1998
。
Thompson
and
Richardson,
1998
。
Arnott and
Rowse, 1999
。
Tam and Lam,
2000
。
Wong et
al., 2000
。
Waterson et al., 2001>. In many decision-making
situations
in
transportation
(modal
split,
choice
of
air
carrier,
choice
of
airport,
etc.>
the
competitive
alternatives and their characteristics
are reasonably well
known in advance to
the decision maker (passenger, driver>.
On the other hand, the drivers usually
discover diffierent
parking
alternatives
one
by
one
in
a
temporal
sequence.
Clearly, this
temporal sequence has a very strong
in
?
uence
on
the
driver's
?
nal
decision
about
the
parking
9E3d
During
the
past
two
decades,
traffic
authorities
in
many cities (Helsinki, Cologne, Mainz,
Stuttgart, Wiesbaden,
Aalborg, Hague>
have started to inform and guide drivers to
parking
facilities
with
real-time
var-iable
message
signs
[directional
arrows,
names
of
the
parking
facilities,
status (full,
not full, number of available parking spaces,
etc.>].
Information
about
the
number
of
available
parking
spaces
could
be
displayed
on
the
major
roads,
streets
and
intersections,
or
it
could
be
distributed
through
the
DGiT
It is logical to ask the question
about the bene
?
ts of
the
parking
guidance
systems.
Current
practice
shows
that
parking
guidance
systems
usually
do
not
change
the
occupancy rate or
average parking duration. Drivers easily
become
familiar
with
the
parking
guidance
systems,
and
majority of them use,
thrust and appreciate the help of the
systems.
Guidance
systems
signi
?
cantly
increase
the
probability
of
finding
vacant
parking
space,
mitigate
frustration
of
the
drivers
–
visitors
unfamiliar
with
the
city
center,
decrease
the
queues
in
front
of
parking
garages,
decrease
the
total
amount
of
vehicle-miles
traveled
(particularly
in
the
city
centers>,
decrease
the
average
trip
time,
energy
consumption,
and
air
pollution.
Parking guidance system is a part of
comprehensive parking
policy and
traffic management system, whose other elements
are
street
parking
control
(including
sanctions
for
the
illegally
parked
vehicles>,
parking
fare
structure,
and
parking revenue management
system.5PCzVD7HxA
Parking
guidance
systems
help
drivers
to
?
nd
vacant
parking
spaces
when
they
are
already
on
the
network,
and
approaching
their
?
nal
destination.
Throughout
this
research the concepts of the parking
reservation system and
parking
revenue
management
system
are
proposed.
Such
systems
would
help
drivers
to
?
nd
a
vacant
parking
space
even
before
beginning
their
trip.
The
proposed
‘‘intelligent’’
parking
space
inventory
control
system
that
is
based
on
the
combination
of
simulation,
optimization
techniques,
and
fuzzy
l
ogic
makes
‘‘real
-
time’’
decisions as to whether to reject or accept a new
request
for
parking.
The
proposed
methodology
could
be
applied
for parking lots and parking garages in cities and
at the big international
AILg
The
paper
is
organized
as
follows:
Parking-pricing
problems
are
presented
in
Section
2.
Analogies
between
parking problems and some other
industries are presented in
Section
3.
The
parking
revenue
management
system
is
introduced in Section 4, and the
Intelligent parking space
inventory
control
system
is
introduced
in
Section
5.
The
algorithm
to
create
intelligent
parking
spaces
inventory
control system is
presented in Section 6. Results obtained
with
the
‘‘intelligent’’
parking
system
are
given
in
Section
7,
and
Sec-tion
8
presents
the
concluding
remarks
and further research 74J0X
2.
parking pricing
In majority of cities throughout
the world drivers pay
for using
different parking facilities. In some instances,
traffic congestion can be significantly
reduced as a result
of
parking
price.
The
parking
revenue
is
usually
used
to
cover parking facility costs (access
gates, ticket printers,
parking
meters,
parking
signs,
attendants>,
or
to
improve
some other traffic and transportation
activities. Different
parking
pricing
strategies
should
be
a
part
of
the
comprehensive
solution
approach
to
the
complex
traffic
congestion problems. There is no doubt
that parking pricing
represents
one
of
the
important
demand
management
strategies.
ForLDAYtRyKfE
example,
traffic authorities, local governments and private
sector
could
introduce
higher
parking
tariffs
for
solo
drivers
or
for
long-term
parkers
in
congested
city
areas.
They could provide
special parking discounts to vanpoolers.
Obviously
parking
pricing
should
be
carefully
studied
in
the
context
of
the
considered
city
area
(down-
town,
residential, commercial, retail
use areas>.Zzz6ZB2Ltk
In
some
cities
(Madison,
Wisconsin>
there
are
already
time dependent parking fees that force
commuters to switch
to
diffierent
alternatives
of
public
transportation
(/bcp/>.
Trying
to
promote
public
transit
San
Francisco
traffic
authorities
increased parking tariffs at public and
commercial garages.
The
Chicago
authorities
raised
parking
rates
few
times <
/p>
(/fta/library/planning/tdmstatus/
m>.
As
a
consequence,
the
total
number
of
cars
parked
significantly decreased, as well as
parking duration time.
The greatest
decrease was in the number of all day parkers.
Authorities in Seattle
signi
?
cantly reduced parking
tariffs
for
carpool
at
two
Seattle
parking
facilities
in
downtown
(/DOCS/>.
Active
role
in
parking
pricing
strategies
could
also
have
employers
paying
for
employees' parking.
Employers who remove parking subsidies
for
the
employees
could
significantly
decrease
the
total
number
of
solo
drivers.
The
main
role
of
any
parking
pricing
strategy
should
be
reducing
the
total
number
of
vehicle
trips
during
certain
time
periods,
shifting
commuters
to
alternative
transportation
modes,
and
to
different
parking locations. At the same time, when trying
to implement any parking strategy, it
is very important to
provide
enough
parking
space
for
shoppers,
to
provide
preferential parking
for residents in considered city area,
to
provide
preferential
parking
for
different
parking
locations, to
consider low income families, and to protect
streets in the neighborhood from
illegal wMI1
The basic
economic concepts of supply and demand should
be
more
utilized
when
solving
complex
traffic
congestion
and parking
problems (Vickrey, 1969,
1994
。
Verhoef et al.,
1995>. So-called value pricing is also
known as congestion