Why finding a place to park in Montreal just got a whole lot easier
Global News
A tech company has launched a new AI-driven mobile app to help Montreal drivers decipher confusing parking signs and, ultimately, avoid steep fines and having their cars towed.
It’s no secret that it can be complicated to find legal parking on Montreal streets. The rules are endless: road cleaning schedules, permit-only stretches and traffic lanes, to name a few.
Standing in front of a pole with multiple parking restriction signs attached to it in Old Montreal, one driver marveled at how difficult it is to understand and quickly summed up the headaches behind finding a safe spot.
“The stars must align,” he said. “Jupiter and Saturn must align. It’s a little weird.”
But what if there was an app for that?
A Quebec company launched a new AI-driven application in May to help drivers decipher confusing parking signs and, ultimately, avoid steep fines and having their vehicles towed away.
Underlabs came up with the idea of Parky.ai after one of its members, its chief technology officer, was confused by a sign and came back to find a ticket on the windshield.
“We thought that artificial intelligence could solve this problem,” said Andrei Chira, senior software engineer at Underlabs. “So we decided to create the most simple app where you just take a picture of all the parking signs and boom — it tells you if you’re allowed to park there using artificial intelligence.”
All drivers have to do is take a photo of the parking restrictions in the app. Parky.ai then processes the photo and gives a yes or no answer on whether you can safely park there or not.
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