On Wednesday, the Boston City Council held a hearing to consider an ordinance filed by Councilor Frank Baker that has the potential to render mobile apps like Haystack inoperable. Testifying on behalf of the company and hoping to sway the minds of the Council was founder and CEO Eric Meyer, though, it seems his plea fell on deaf ears. A rival parking solution, however, operating fully within the bounds of the law, has engaged in more positive talks with Mayor Marty Walsh’s administration.
Though the ordinance doesn’t mention Haystack by name, it does describe many of the ways the parking solution operates:
No person or entity other than the City of Boston and any of its departments or designees shall have the authority to sell, lease, reserve, or facilitate the reserving of any street, way, highway, road or parkway, or portion thereof under the City of Boston’s control.
In essence, the City Council thinks Haystack profiteers from public space by allowing one user to alert another of a soon-to-be vacant parking spot – and earn money by doing so. The SPOT parking app is a similar service with one major difference: It offers up privately-owned parking spots, instead of public ones.
Think of it as the Airbnb of parking.
We caught up with Braden Golub, founder and CEO of SPOT, to find out the response SPOT has received so far from Boston’s innovation class, as well as City Hall, and how this will impact the cringe-worthy parking scene here in The Hub; here’s a parsed down version of our conversation.
How did you come up with the idea of SPOT parking?
Like many other Back Bay/South End Residents, I was shelling out an exorbitant amount of money for my parking spot each month. Each time my fiancé stayed at my place, I would have to wake up at 8 a.m. and run to her car (half a mile away) and either move it so it wouldn’t get towed for street cleaning or put money in the meter. Coming back one summer morning from doing just that, I saw that 20 out of 25 spaces in my private lot were empty. That’s when the lightbulb went off.
Briefly, explain to me how it works.
This works for every single Bostonian who has a parking spot because anyone who has one doesn’t utilize it 100 percent of the time! You leave for work for the day, go on a vacation for the weekend, or perhaps you have a spot that just sits empty because you got a spot with your apartment/office but don’t have a car. All you have to do is list your spot on our app and other SPOT users will pay you for access to that spot. The spot owner sets their own pricing, takes a picture of it and that’s it…they can start earning cash immediately. You can rent your spot hourly, daily, weekly or monthly. It’s a cashless transaction, so the person renting your spot inputs their CC one time into our system, just like Uber, and we pay out the spot owners through direct deposit, venmo, paypal or cut them a check.
For the end user who is looking for parking, simply pull up the app on your mobile device, pick a spot that meets your needs and it’s literally three clicks and you found yourself a cheaper parking alternative than expensive garages without having to worry about tickets, towing or circling the block.
What kind of conversations have you had with City Hall? Is SPOT “legal”?
The city was quite intrigued and excited about the SPOT platform for a few different reasons. We are tapping into an untapped resource that is private parking, which is essentially bringing more parking spots onto the Boston market. This will alleviate some of the congestion of the public metered spaces and there won’t be anyone circling the block creating traffic jams. Furthermore, it will actually entice Bostonians to come into the city more often without the hassle/high expense of parking, boosting the downtown economy whether it be from spending money at restaurants, retail establishments or tourist attractions.
As far as legalities are concerned, we are merely marrying two consumers who haven’t had the means to communicate before our technology was built. These are private resources, and our user understands that they are earning money for use of their under-utilized private asset. We aren’t dealing with public or city owned property; these are driveways or private spots that the citizens of Boston aren’t fully capitalizing on. If we can crack this private parking market and bring it to the public, then it’s a win-win across the board.
What else do you need before fully launching?
Right now we are focusing 110 percent of our efforts on curating the SPOT inventory. Just seven short weeks into Beta, our team is doing an awesome job in letting Bostonians know that if they have a parking spot, try out the platform and see if you can earn some quick money by renting it out to another SPOT user. Whether it’s during the day or you’ve left for the weekend, your parking spot is sitting empty anyway, so why not put it to work for you? It’s like ‘found’ money!
Once we have a solid footprint in and around Boston with enough supply to meet the high parking demand, we will fully launch to the masses. Having said that, you CAN download the app and upload your parking spot today! Search for ‘SPOT Park’ in the iOS or Droid App Store or go to our website and download it directly from www.spot-park.com.
Image via SPOT Facebook
