When people think high tech, the parking industry is not always their next thought. The latest innovations in mobile and energy saving technologies have been changing the industry, however, for a few years now. These changes have been helping car parks and garage owners stay profitable in a time where costs and societal changes are putting pressure on their finances. The cost of operating parking structures has increased, and an anticipated trend of fewer cars on the road thanks to automated vehicles and convenient ride share services may reduce revenues.
Parking facilities can improve their numbers in spite thereof by offering convenience to their clients. New smartphone apps allow clients to book their parking spot online. More intelligent displays help clients move around the parking and find a free spot easily. Image recognition technologies are making clients feel relaxed about their own safety and knowing their vehicles are safer than ever; Parking clients cannot be happier, parking facilities are becoming more and more user-friendly. But convenience means nothing without efficiency, and efficiency, in terms of parking, means LPR-technology.
License Plate Recognition technology has also developed enormously during the past few years. It improves the user’s experience and guarantees an impressive detection rate. At Quercus Technologies we are specialists in license plate recognition and computer-vision technologies. Our last product, SmartLPR Access integrates in one device all that is needed to provide the highest reliability all over the world, without sacrificing comfort: all configuration can be made on the web and the lens can be adjusted remotely, making the unit setup easy, accessible and automatized.
In fact, SmartLPR Access functions thanks to a computer system that controls entry and exit movements of the vehicles through highly accurate license plate recognition. This system is called Car Access capability and it is included in our BirdWatch Smart Parking Suite. With all this information, Car Access allows for a better control of the access lanes. Our powerful OCR and holistic computer vision algorithms can manage country-specific features recognizing both Latin and Arabic alphabets; states and numbers like in American or Mexican plates or colour-coded plates such as Qatari or EAU plates. The algorithms developed by Quercus are constantly updated in order to obtain highly reliable recognition for license plates worldwide.
The latest innovation of Quercus is HHR - High Reliability Recognition. Two SmartLPR Access cameras are installed on the same lane in order to get a "double reading" of the license plate. A camera captures the front plate while a second one reads the rear plate. Combining both captures, the reliability rate increases. The front plate is usually more difficult to read because of the dirt, the weather, temperature changes or the effect of salt used to melt the snow that can damage the plate. Comparing the front plate with the rear plate makes much easier the identification of the vehicle.
HHR combines convenience with efficacy. Its reliability reaches much more than 99 percent in the majority of countries, allowing a comforting experience for the client without the hassle of paper tickets and the congestion they may cause, while reducing administrative expenses and maintenance costs, therefore increasing revenue for operators.