Re:One little detail... (Score 4, Insightful)

Yeah. The article fails to elaborate on the true reason for this system: to raise or lower prices based on demand. I live in San Francisco and I love it. I drive a motorcycle so my parking is cheap. This system is not designed to help the consumer, it's to help the city government. Which is fine but I hate how they are presenting it as a boon to people looking for parking spaces.

They feed us some vision of people 'shopping' for cheaper parking spaces a bit further away, which will never happen. In this city, nobody will pass up a parking spot no matter how much it costs. So this is just a way for the City to squeeze more money out of you during certain times of day.

I still don't know how they can tout the smartphone apps but still have laws on the books making it illegal to use smartphones while you are driving. Are we to bring a 'spotter' with us everywhere we go?

Anyway, the novelty will wear off soon enough, I guess. Maybe one day this technology will be universally built into GPS units or something but for now I don't really see it catching on.