Can’t Find a Parking Spot? Check Smartphone

San Francisco is preparing to undertake the nation’s most ambitious trial of a wireless sensor network that will announce which parking spaces are free at any moment.

Drivers will be alerted to empty parking places either by displays on street signs, or by looking at maps on screens of their smartphones. They may even be able to pay for parking by cellphone, and add to the parking meter from their phones without returning to the car.

NYT: SF’s New Parking sensor network