Cutting Through the Bother of City Parking

But for tourists or urban newcomers, a well-chosen app, like PrimoSpot ($3 on Android and Apple) or ParkDroid (free on Android), offers cheap protection against that blood-draining moment when you can’t find your car and fear it has been towed or stolen.
Some of the most promising parking-related apps, like Google’s OpenSpot (free on Android) and TakeMySpot (free on Apple), offer users the greater hope of finding empty parking spots as they materialize. Sadly, they don’t work — at least not yet.
Others, like BestParking (free on Apple and Android) and PrimoSpot, don’t aspire to such heights, but they do save time and money. PrimoSpot can help find free or less expensive parking, while keeping track of where you left your car or bike. BestParking is for those who want to compare the prices of parking lots or garages.

First, though, a caveat about PrimoSpot; the service works only in New York, Seattle and Boston. That is two more cities than were available a year ago, though, so at least the trend is moving in the right direction.
Users in those cities are greeted with a Google map that displays three modes — one for drivers seeking on-street parking, one for parking garages and another for bicyclists who are looking for a parking rack.

The map is nicely responsive, and, because of a recent Google Maps upgrade, features three-dimensional building outlines.
When you enlarge the view to see a particular neighborhood, icons of five colors appear on each side of the street, telling you how long that curbside stretch will be available for parking before street sweeping or other city services close it off. The icons denote various time lengths — one day or more, for instance, or two days or more — while a black icon suggests you should look elsewhere.
The most important icon bears a star, which denotes streets that are about to become free for parking. If your timing is right, you can drop into a free space before the street sweepers have disappeared from view.

After you have parked, select the Park Me Here option, and the app will remind you where you are, by posting to the map an icon representing your car. You can also add notes about where you parked, take a photo of the area and set an alert for when the free parking period expires.
Despite these helpful touches, the app can be slightly confusing at times.
For instance, I planned a fictitious morning meeting last week to New York’s Gramercy Park area, and, on Second Avenue near 22nd Street, the red icon on PrimoSpot’s map suggested that, in an hour, parking would not be available.

I tapped the icon and saw photos of the block’s parking signs, which said confusingly that drivers may park there anytime but 8 a.m. to 8:30 a.m. on Monday through Saturday.
It turns out that the app was trying to tell me that I could park there for only one hour.
Michael Hill, PrimoSpot’s chief executive, said the company’s main focus was on helping find a spot “right now,” as if you might be circling an area with one hand on the smartphone and another on the wheel — or on your handlebars, because a second map mode offers parking counsel for bicyclists, with photos as well.
If these benefits aren’t enough to justify PrimoSpot’s price, the Garage mode can help.
For my fictitious Gramercy Park visit, I glanced at the nearby garages. Three charged about $40 for up to 24 hours, while another charged $25. It would have been nice if PrimoSpot had calculated the 18.375 percent tax that helped me arrive at those figures, but at least it found a bargain.

Starting this month, Mr. Hill said, PrimoSpot would start offering mobile coupons for some parking garages.
Aside from those discounts, I could have gotten much of the garage-specific information free, at the nicely designed mobile Web site of BestParking.com.
The company’s Android and iPhone app is well worth the download because it covers much more ground than PrimoSpot, with 18 cities and 79 airports in its database.

I searched for parking near Kennedy Airport in New York, for instance, and found 13 parking sites nearby.
How close nearby? It’s anyone’s guess. BestParking’s map, and the pages devoted to each parking site, don’t offer such information.
The app is helpful in other ways, though. In the detailed descriptions of each parking site, the app includes estimates of how much drivers may pay, depending on when they arrive or depart.
Also, if you’re looking for parking garages for just a few hours, the app estimates the charges. (Taxes are included).
For my visit in Manhattan, BestParking turned up the same low-price garage that PrimoSpot found. This time, though, BestParking told me the garage offers a special $16 rate for those who arrive by 2:30 p.m.
One thing missing from BestParking is an option to set your car’s location, so you can find it later. Android users who want that option at no charge should try ParkDroid and Apple users TakeMySpot, although users of the Apple app should not expect much from its core feature.
TakeMySpot and OpenSpot are meant to help altruistic people tell others about parking spots that are open. Both offer “karma points” (a virtual pat on the back) to those who share that information, but judging from the absence of marked spots in New York and other cities last week, drivers need bigger incentives to help their neighbors.

Still, it’s worth a try. Next time I leave a good spot I’ll announce it to the world. Maybe someone will do that for me next time.
  Good luck with that.