There’s no denying that parking can sometimes be a bit of a headache on college campuses.
Fortunately, parking at Cal Poly can be done in a snap with an app that’s gaining more and more attention.
It’s an app that lets you pay for parking with your phone and lets you ditch the coins: It’s called ParkMobile.
"I think it was convenient for that because a lot of times we don’t have quarters out and stuff on us," said one student named Angela.
The meters that use the app have a lime green sign on them. There are 324 parking spots around campus to choose from.
Every space you have to pay for has a zone number on the sign, so you enter that into your app and choose the amount of time you want to park.
"We wanted to park closer to where the hike was so we just drove our car all the way over there and I had downloaded the app on my phone and use it for that but it was just to make it more convenient on the hike," Angela added.
"If you need to extend time you can do that right in the app as well so you don’t have to like run back to your car and feed the meter," said Jeff Perkins, Chief Marketing Officer for ParkMobile.
Another feature of the app is that you can find your way back to your car in case you forget where you parked. You can save your favorite zones in the app, and you can manage up to five cars in the app as well.
Visitors can also reserve parking ahead of time, but that’s only for certain campus events.
The company says the app launched at Cal Poly at the end of 2016. Close to 5,000 Mustangs now use the app when school is in session.
We asked one student if he will eventually download the app:
"I think so," said Jasen Journeycake. "Right now, it’s pretty tough to keep change on hand, especially in my car. I think it would be a lot more efficient."
Keep in mind that you will be charged a service fee of 35 cents when using the app.
The app launched in 2008 nationwide, and 10,000,000 people have downloaded the app in that time.
It’s 99 cents to download.
The university says that there are currently more than 7,400 parking spaces on campus. More than 400 more spots will be added in the future.
