Basically the same here in Tallinn, Estonia. We just have a sign that says the area you are in, city center, old town, etc. You just text the area your in and your license plate number. You can either get a 1 hour permit, 6 hour permit, or just a metered one that charges you for the time you where there (you send another message when you leave and it just calculates how long you where there). Its not more expensive, same price as using the machines and its super easy.

I don't see why more places don't do this. Instead of running to the meter every hour to throw another quarter in the machine, just send a sms from wherever you are.

I live in Estonia and have been noticing this for quite some time. Funny thing is, I only get Russian language spam, a language I don't speak at all and never have been associated with speaking, no idea why the spammers seam to think I speak it. You would think if they spammed Estonia, they would do it in Estonian but I have never gotten any in Estonian. Even the company's inbox where I work gets only Russian spam.

It shows up in my gmail every day and what sucks is no matter how many of them I mark as spam (they are for sure spam, I got my Russian friend to translate a few and they are all about pills and whatnot) I still get them in my inbox. I wish there was a "any emails in this language are spam" setting but alas, there is not.

"The handles pop out as you are within a meter of your door"

Lets see. You get out of your car, close the door, then forget you left your whatever in the car but now you have to walk away from it then walk back to it just to get the door open again? Or you are loading stuff into the back seat and the stupid front door keeps popping the handle in and out for no reason just you are coming and going often. You are standing by your door talking to someone and it keeps popping in and out even though you want nothing to do with the handle, you just have the keys in your pocket. Thats just stupid, its not difficult to push a button or turn a key.

"Then the car starts while you are sitting"

Have you never sat in your car while it was off? Just killing time in a parking lot eating some lunch just to get out of the office? I would be super annoyed if I went into a fast food place, came and sat in my car to just be able to enjoy my meal in my own environment and the stupid car turns on, wasting gas and being generally annoying. There are more reasons to be in your car without it on but, this being slashdot, I am sure you haven't had the experience yet.

The RFID MIGHT be able to be done properly but I don't know how and none of the arguments you gave make me want RFID over a regular key.