Apparatus and methods related providing city services, such as parking, are described. Methods and apparatus for providing parking rewards programs are described. The methods and apparatus can include maintaining accounts for participants in the rewards program, tracking purchases of parking and other participant activities and determining parking awards based upon the activities. The parking rewards programs can be used to incentivize behaviors that balance the use of the parking space commodity according to the needs of different stakeholders, such as the city, residents, merchants and visitors. For example, parking awards and the criteria used for earning awards can be used to encourage particular behaviors while a parking space is being utilized, such as shopping, the use of public transportation or efficient trip planning.

A parking meter includes a housing, processor, memory, network interface, display screen, first camera facing outward from the first side of the housing, second camera facing outward from the housing towards a parking space, and a payment acceptor. The meter is configured to sense a vehicle's presence in the parking space, capture an identification of the vehicle, transmit the identification to a remote networked computer system, determine that a parking violation has occurred, transmit the notice to the remote computer system, accept payment of fines, transmit notice of fine payment to the remote computer system, reset the parking time period to zero upon the vehicle's exit from the parking space, and receive updated parking rate parameters by the processor from the remote computer system via the network interface.

A parking meter detects an object in proximity, based on a change in a proximity measurement at the meter, activates a directional sensor in response to detecting the object, receives sensor data at a meter processor from the directional sensor, wherein the received sensor data indicates a predetermined direction to the detected object relative to the meter. The parking meter determines a presence of the object, or lack thereof, in the predetermined direction based on the sensor data, and upon a positive determination of the presence of the object, stores an indication of the presence of the object along with a time of the positive determination.

An electronic single-space parking meter mechanism is provided. The electronic single-space parking meter mechanism includes an inner housing having a front side and a rear side. The meter mechanism includes wireless communications hardware including an antenna. The meter mechanism includes a payment reader supported by the inner housing and an electronic display screen supported by the inner housing. At least a portion of the antenna is located above at least a portion of the electronic display screen.

A parking management platform enables an event-based vehicle parking service. Operational features afforded by the vehicle parking service include Waitlist AutoBuy, which automatically purchases a parking space if one becomes available before an event; Waitlist Notification, which notifies a user when a parking space becomes available; Cancel and Buy, which allows a user to cancel a purchased event parking pass before a pre-event deadline and later repurchase the same event parking pass; Transfer to Another Person, which allows transfer of a parking pass to another person; Transfer to Another Event, which allows transfer of an event parking pass for use at a future event; Redemption of Transferred Parking Pass, which allows a recipient of a transferred parking pass to redeem it without payment; and Attendance Confirmation, which allows a user to confirm attendance or to exchange, transfer, or cancel the event parking pass for a different event parking pass.

A system is for monitoring arrival of a vehicle at a given location. The system includes a server, and a vehicle sensing device. The vehicle sensing device is configured to sense arrival of the vehicle to the given location, and to cause information about the vehicle to be transmitted to the server in response to sensing arrival of the vehicle to the given location. The server is configured to determine a context of the vehicle based upon the information about the vehicle, and take action based on the context of the vehicle. The system may be installed at parking lots, shipping yards, restaurants, stores, and other locations.

Methods, systems, apparatuses, and computer readable media for facilitating reservation for a parking space with a near field communications (NFC)-enabled device are provided. A system can include an NFC-enabled parking meter associated with a parking space and a controller in communication with the NFC-enabled parking meter for measuring time and processing payment. A system can include an NFC-enabled device that upon interfacing with the NFC-enabled parking meter communicates with the controller to create a reservation of a parking space.

A vehicular parking system includes a parking server, which includes: (a) a wireless transceiver to receive a first wireless signal, indicating that a user of a vehicle that is associated with a smartphone has commenced a paid parking session; (b) a parking session commencement unit that, in response to the first wireless signal, updates a parking record in the vehicular parking system, to indicate that the vehicle is associated with the paid parking session. The wireless transceiver, subsequently, receives a second wireless signal, indicating that the smartphone has autonomously determined to end the paid parking session, based on an autonomous analysis of the smartphone. A parking session termination unit of the server, in response to the second wireless signal, updates the parking record to indicate that the vehicle is no longer associated with any paid parking session.

An application that creates a dynamic ad hoc network by wirelessly linking a plurality of mobile Bluetooth transceivers. The dynamic ad hoc network enables communication between a transmitting Bluetooth transceiver and a receiving Bluetooth transceiver through at least one intermediary Bluetooth transceiver exclusive of other higher power consuming and expensive communication protocols, such as cellular networks. The network provides a number of solutions, including transportation management, traffic alerts, traffic telematics, information associated with road signs, warnings of speed limit changes, navigation, emergency scenarios (more specifically in a condition where a cellular network is inoperable or unavailable), etc. Navigation can utilize GPS, motion sensors, references from RF beacons signals, and the like to determine a user's location and routing.

A parking enforcement system can include a weather resistant housing, a processor disposed inside of the housing, a memory disposed inside of the housing and coupled to the processor, a network interface disposed in the housing and coupled to the processor, a first camera disposed in the housing and facing outward towards a first parking space. The processor can be configured to recognize when a vehicle first occupies the first parking space and determine a classification for the vehicle.