A Collaborative Approach to Finding Available Parking Spots

This paper investigates the design and feasibility of Co-Park, where a group of connected vehicles in a parking facility collaborate with each other to find available parking spots in a timely fashion. Vehicles measure occupancy of the surrounding parking spots by their on-board sensors, and share the occupancy information with other group members over vehicular networks. Based on prediction of the short-term occupancy variation and coordination among group members, the vehicles strategically plan efficient paths to search for an available spot. Simulation results show that the system can significantly reduce the trip time in a parking facility.