Streamlining Parking Inventory Collection with Geospatial AI

Discover how Urban SDK uses geospatial AI to automate parking inventory collection, saving time and improving accuracy for city planners and transportation teams.

Collecting up-to-date parking inventory — knowing where curbside parking is allowed and how many spaces exist — is a major challenge for cities. Traditional methods rely on manual field surveys: staff or contractors walk or drive every street, count spaces, note restrictions, and record everything on maps. These surveys are slow, expensive, and quickly go out of date.

Urban SDK notes that its approach allows cities to replace manual data collection and save staff time. In practice, an on-the-ground count that took weeks can be done in minutes with AI. The goal is to keep parking maps accurate so planners can manage congestion, curb use, and accessibility. As Urban SDK puts it, this new strategy is “Inventory from AI” – it leverages satellite imagery and AI data to survey roadway inventory and facility characteristics, including on-street parking.

Geospatial AI in Action

Geospatial AI tools can instantly sweep an entire city’s road network using aerial or satellite imagery. In Urban SDK’s platform, you simply upload city boundary data and the system surveys your entire roadway system instantly with GIS details of physical and operational elements. The AI then analyzes the overhead images to recognize road geometry and features.

For parking, the vision algorithms detect curb lanes and individual parked vehicles or painted stripes, so the system knows where cars can park and roughly how many spaces fit. In effect, the AI counts cars and curb markings automatically, rather than requiring staff to measure them on foot. The result is a detailed, up-to-date inventory of sidewalks, bike lanes, travel lanes and street parking, all derived from imagery instead of slow surveys.

Urban SDK’s AI-Powered Platform

Urban SDK’s software makes these capabilities accessible. Cities can capture your entire county, city or a subdivision in less time. Once the network is indexed, planners can click any road segment or address and retrieve a full set of attributes. The Roadway Characteristics data – generated by the AI – includes everything from lane counts and widths to sidewalk and bike lane geometry.

Crucially, it also includes curb features like on-street parking type (e.g. parallel or angled) and even estimated parking stall counts. Urban SDK’s interface lets officials search by location, filter by road class, or simply click on a map to see these details.

Real-World Impact and Case Studies

Cities already using Urban SDK report big wins. The City of Camas, WA, saw great time savings due to, "having the information at our fingertips. We are not making nearly as many trips to the field." In other words, parking and traffic data that once required setting up counters and walking streets can now be accessed with a click. 

Likewise, a public works engineer in McAllen, TX praised the system’s easy access to quick, reliable data that lets the city make faster decisions. This means answers to curb-related questions come quickly. 

In Chesapeake, VA, officials say they can now handle citizen concerns without keeping them waiting because all the needed road and parking data is instantly available. These testimonials underline how automated inventory turns into practical benefits: staff spend less time surveying and more time planning or fixing problems.

You can explore more real-world success stories, customer use cases, and outcomes on our Customer Stories page — or visit urbansdk.com/case-studies to see how public sector leaders are achieving results with Urban SDK.

Key Benefits of Geospatial AI for Parking

• Efficiency: Automating the inventory saves huge amounts of time. As one city reported, the AI approach gave information at our fingertips, greatly reducing field visits. Urban SDK customers note that the process is streamlined and much faster than before.
• Cost Savings: Because the AI can re-run surveys at will, agencies can update parking inventories frequently for a fraction of the cost of traditional manual methods. There’s no need to hire crews every time policy changes or new construction happens.
• Rich, Accurate Data: The AI extracts detailed road attributes from imagery – including the presence and extent of parking lanes – so the data is more complete and consistent than patchwork manual counts. Officials appreciate the quality of these insights: as one said, the platform delivers quick, reliable data that supports faster decision-making. Having all curb and parking metrics in one place means planners can spot shortages or conflicts early.
• Responsive Planning: With instant access to curb inventories and traffic data, cities can answer residents’ parking questions on the spot. 

Overall, geospatial AI transforms parking inventory from a laborious chore into a scalable, automated process. Cities save staff time and money, while gaining a richer dataset for mobility planning. Up-to-date parking maps help optimize curb space – easing congestion and improving safety – and support data-driven policies (like dynamic pricing or permit zones) that boost mobility. 

Urban SDK’s platform illustrates how modern cities can harness AI to turn raw imagery into actionable parking and roadway intelligence, enabling better planning and improved urban transportation for all.