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parking difficulty

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More parking features added to Google Maps, including difficulty icons in 25 non-US cities

Scott Scrivens

Back in January, Google Maps on Android added a handy new parking availability feature, letting you know the likelihood of finding a spot at your destination. It was initially only available in a handful of US cities. Since the v9.51 Maps beta update in April, a parking difficulty icon is visible before you even start navigation, so you can change your destination accordingly if parking is going to be too difficult. Now, that feature is coming to 25 new cities in regions outside the US, such as Canada, Brazil, Russia, and various European countries.

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Google Maps v9.51 beta adds new details about parking, prepares to improve route planning with parking suggestions and traffic charts [APK Teardown + Download]

Cody Toombs

It's time for another update to Google Maps. Like so many other version bumps, this one includes a couple of great gifts to get users where they want to go. The focus of this release appears to be directed at parking. There are now indicators to show if there is on-site parking and whether it's free or paid. The theme continues into the teardown with a feature that will help drivers plan to find parking near their destination before getting there.

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Google's researchers explain the challenges and calculation process behind the new Parking Difficulty feature in Maps

Rita El Khoury

A few weeks ago, a new Parking Difficulty icon started showing up in Google Maps 9.44 beta in some cities in the United States, then Google officially announced it and specified where it's available. It also said that the estimate is "based on historical parking data," similar to how traffic and popular times and visit durations are calculated, but it didn't go into a lot of details. Now those details are further clarified in a post on the Google Research Blog.

The difficulties of calculating parking availability stem from the many, many factors that can influence the equation: time and day and weather and holidays/events, permit or illegal parking in park-meter areas, vacant spots with paid park-meters from cars that left early, parking lots with multiple levels and different structures, and so on. Even with these issues accounted for, there's the false data coming from private/gated parking spots, taxis dropping users who look like they immediately found a parking and reached their destination, and bus stops showing up in the data sets as popular parking spots.

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[Updated] Google Maps 9.44 shows parking availability and Atmosphere images [APK Download]

Rita El Khoury

Back in August, Cody found strings in his teardown of Google Maps v9.34 beta that hinted at an upcoming display of parking difficulty. The option may have crept up for some users since then, but now we have our first glance into how the feature will work since it has started showing up for more is live for users on Maps v9.44 beta.

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