Parking Spot Pursuit Sends Drivers Online
March 4,2008
Ottawa SUN
By ELISABETH JOHNS, SUN MEDIA
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Danielle Doran poses for a photo in her driveway yesterday. The Ottawa Heart Institute employee spent months searching for a parking spot close to work before she stumbled across a website dedicated to brokering places to park. (Darren Calabrese/Sun Media)
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Danielle Doran has spent months searching for a parking spot close to work. Like most Ottawans, the 28-year-old is finding parking hard to come by.
Doran, who works at the Ottawa Heart Institute, said there's a waiting list for employee parking. The Kanata resident didn't even bother applying. Instead, she'll park at the visitor and patient lot for $13 a day. That adds up to $260 a month.
"It's a lot of money," she said. Finding a parking spot can be one of the most irksome and frustrating aspects of driving in the city.
Enter parkingspots.com, an online marketplace for people looking to rent their parking space and for those seeking a spot to park.
Doran went onto craigslist.org to find people who might be renting out spots and that's how she stumbled across parkingspots.com.
Whether it's a condo dweller who doesn't own a car but has a spot to rent or a homeowner who has extra space in their driveway, Aynsley Deluce, one of the site's creators, said most people don't realize they're sitting on a "potential moneymaker."
UNCONVENTIONAL PARKING
She and her husband, Matthew Ball, launched the site last month as a way to help others find somewhat unconventional parking as those spots in urban areas become extinct through development.
"We have so many requests from Ottawa," she said. "It's clear there's a really, really big demand that's just not being met."
Every day, on average, she said, there are about 10 to 20 requests from people looking for parking spots. "We can't seem to keep enough spots on the site to keep up with the demand."
"Ottawa, by far, is our best and worst -- which means there's a parking problem."
As for Doran, she's still hoping something comes up soon.
http://www.ottawasun.com/News/OttawaAndRegion/2008/03/04/4898461-sun.html
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