"Searching" for a Parking Spot?

Ever feel like finding a parking space is like winning the lottery? Especially if you live in a dense metropolitan area, you know what a hassle it can be to find parking: leaving your house early to make sure you have enough time to find a spot; slowing to a crawl in the right line looking for people who might be leaving while drivers behind you honk for driving so slowly; finally finding a spot only realize that you don't have any quarters for the meter; and ultimately giving up and forking over $20 bucks for valet...all in all, a great way to start a fun evening!

Now, one startup is offering a potential solution: SpotScout hopes to create an online marketplace where drivers can not only reserve private spaces in garages and driveways, but also swap public parking spots in real time (i.e., from cell phones), with vacant spaces going to the highest bidder...sort of an eBay for parking.

The Cambridge, MA-based company envisions two services for drivers: securing a spot before leaving home ("SpotScouting"), and selling an unused or vacant parking space (such as a private driveway) to the top bidder, a process they call "SpotCasting." Hoping to capitalize on the growing popularity of mobile web-surfing and big-city parking frustrations, the company still faces the challenge of winning over a sufficient customer base willing to give up the traditional method of hunting for parking spaces. To gauge consumer response, SpotScout is offering test versions of the service in Boston, New York and San Francisco, with eventual roll-outs planned for other major metropolitan markets. Though many questions remain about making this business viable on a large scale, including determining transaction fees and clearing regulatory hurdles with municipal parking authorities, the startup will also have to contend with other new parking services cropping out of GPS-enabled technologies and electronically-monitored public garages.

For now, we have yet to see how big this idea can become. But, if there were ever a better application of free-market economics, in my opinion this would certainly make the top-10 list (at least for creativity).

For more about SpotScout, check out this article on FoxNews.