technology | Calgary Car Guy

Google Open Spot alerts Android users to freed parking spaces — Engadget

Google introduced Open Spot, a smartphone app (currently available for Android phones only) that directs users to available free parking spots within a 1.5km radius from their current location.

Read the Engadget review, originally posted July 11, 2010:

Oh, sure — this has certainly been tried before, but given that things like this need a critical mass of followers to be effective, we’re particularly jazzed about Google‘s own initiative.Dubbed ‘Open Spot,’ this bloody brilliant Android (2.0 and up) application enables motorists to search for unclaimed spaces that have been reported by other Open Spot users, and once they head elsewhere, it allows them to mark their spot as open and available.

Once a spot is marked, the color gradually fades from red to yellow the longer it remains unclaimed.

PHOTO: Engadget

Read the full review, via Engadget.

Go to Google Labs website and learn more about Open Spot.

http://openspot.googlelabs.com/img/ny_marking_spot.png

2010: 07/12
POSTED BY: calgarycarguy
CATEGORY: Driving
TAGS: android
engadget
google
open spot
parking
technology
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Smart cars could save dumb drivers | Calgary Herald

Looking at some more advanced technologies that are titled ‘assisted driving’.

Driving.ca take s a look at C2X, Part of the various sub-projects of the German government funded Adaptive and Cooperative Technologies for Intelligent Traffic (AKTIV) project.

From the Calgary Herald, originally posted July 2nd 2010:

Imagine for a moment that a car 300 metres away and around a blind corner has just crashed into a lamppost and is blocking the road.

It is up to the driver to react to the misadventure when it suddenly appears before him or her — usually by slamming on the brakes and/or steering to avoid a potential collision. It all happens so fast, it’s enough to make one’s head spin.

This nasty situation is about to become a non-issue thanks to a system that allows the vehicles on the road to communicate with one another, enabling a vehicle to broadcast its location and monitor the position of hundreds of other cars several times a second.

This system has a broadcast range of around 300 metres, which is about three times farther than that of a traditional radar-based system. As such, it has the ability to “see” around that blind corner because the disabled car is “telling” all other vehicles in the vicinity there is a problem.

Read the full article, via Smart cars could save dumb drivers.