App Makes Philly Parking Easier

Philadelphia is a great place to work, live, and visit. We’ve got the Rocky steps, the cheesesteaks (wit’ or wit’out; your preference), the professional sports, and, hell, this summer we’ll even have the Democratic National Convention. The Pope stopped by to visit last fall, The Donald and Hillary AND Bernie have all swooped through in recent weeks… Philly’s really got it going on, in other words. There is one area where the City of Brotherly Love indubitably falls short, however, and that’s parking. If you have ever driven a car through the city, you know that finding a legal place to park your car can feel nigh on impossible. You have parking zones restricted by time of day, day of the week, residential status, and how long you plan on staying there. It can get downright frustrating. That’s where Parkadelphia comes in.

Philadelphia can be a tough place to park. A new app helps to simplify the process of finding a space.

The new app was developed by Lauren Ancona, a transplant Philadelphian who found herself confused by the availability of residential parking spots. So, she turned to public city and parking department information and created the app, which lets you hone in on any street in Philly and lets you know what the parking rules are. You can search for parking regs where you are headed, or you can find out parking regs for where you are at the moment.

Tim Wisniewski, Philadelphia’s Chief Data Officer, was so impressed by Ancona’s creation that he hired her. She’s now working on expanding Parkadelphia to help residents avoid getting tickets, as well as taking the concept and applying it to other departments. Wisniewski explained it thusly: “We’re trying to connect folks who want the data with the folks who have the data and they get to do all the work.”

Best of all, Ancona insists that, as long as she remains in charge of it, Parkadelphia will remain a free app for all to use.