Drivers in the city can use pay parking in the Green P brand lots throughout the city.
Smartphone users who live and work in Toronto have some good news headed their way as a new mobile app will soon become available that will make it more convenient for them to use the Green P outdoor parking lots that are located throughout the city.
This new smartphone application will let drivers pay for their parking when they leave their cars at those lots.
According to a report that was printed in The Toronto Star, “City-owned Toronto Parking Authority unveiled a free app and said that, by the end of spring, motorists should be able to use it to pay to park — and remotely extend their time if needed — at all outdoor Green P lots that currently use ‘pay and display’ machines.” The Green P mobile app will make it possible for drivers to be able to use their smartphones – instead of cash or plastic cards – to complete a payment transaction to keep their parking fees topped up and to avoid getting a ticket.
Moreover the mobile app also lets those motorists “feed the meter” remotely, without having to go back to the lot.
This type of mobile payments system is being implemented in a growing number of municipalities around the world, as smartphone technology makes it easier for people parking in paid spaces to be able to complete transactions over these ubiquitous devices. Everything from smartphone applications to location based tech such as iBeacons have been put into place to help locals and visitors to cities to be able to feed a meter, or even pay their parking tickets if they didn’t top things up on time.
The Green P app has been designed to send the user an alert to give them a warning that their parking privileges are about to expire, and to give them the chance to remotely add more time if they feel that they will need it. The goal is to make it much more convenient to actually pay for the parking, so that more people will pay for what they need instead of risking a ticket.
The Toronto parking mobile app will be launched at the outdoor Green P lots as of next year.
AT&T is hoping that by working with are businesses, universities and tech organizations, it will be possible.
AT&T has now partnered up with Tech Valley universities, organizations, and businesses in its launch of the “AT&T Tech Valley Civic App Challenge”, in which it is seeking to pair up with innovative thinkers and creators that can come up with mobile apps that will be able to address and overcome local issues – particularly those on a social and civic level.
The challenge will continue for two months and it will end with the awarding of a total of $18,000 in cash prizes.
The goal is to encourage designers, thinkers, developers, artists, and businesspeople to come up with ways to “Solve Local” through the creation and development of innovative mobile apps. Those applications need to help with societal and civic issues that are being faced by people in the greater Tech Valley community. Among the partners in this challenge are: the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; the University at Albany; Center for Economic Growth affiliate, TechConnex; Tech Valley Mobile Developers Network; New York BizLab; Hudson Valley Tech Meetup; Saratoga TechOUT; Hack Upstate, Beahive; and Accelerate 518.
The hope is that the mobile apps that will result will inform citizens and engage them with their governments.
In this way, it could help to illustrate exactly how mobile applications and technologies can make a difference, and will accelerate the development of a new wave of tech jobs and investments as companies seek to get on the bandwagon once the effectiveness of this technology has been shown.
According to the AT&T New York president, Marissa Shorenstein, “AT&T’s commitment to technology innovation in New York grows out of our company’s multi-billion dollar nationwide investment in the mobile communications network of the future.” She also added that by providing both students and career technologists with encouragement within the region for the exploration of smartphone software development, they are also “spotlighting the enormous demand for developers and engineers needed to create the software that will drive our mobile economy.”
The mobile apps challenge was launched in front of over 200 entrepreneurs and technologists from the region and will continue until May 1.
