Is there any AI solution to identify empty parking spaces?

[tofu]

Long shot, but has anyone heard of a way to identify if spots are empty? Parallel parking here is nuts, and they're going to start making us move the cars twice a week now for street cleaning.

It would be helpful if I could get a notification whenever a street parking space in front of my house looks empty. I was thinking I could set up something in home assistant triggered by BI. Would be super convenient as opposed to constantly checking the cameras.

Could something like this be done with a deepstack or sensai model? Maybe train a model of the empty spot, set the zone to that specific area, and turn off static object ignore? Not sure...


Edit2: or set it to cancel alert if it detects a car/truck in that specific zone, and turn off static ignore. Would that just constantly pump out alerts and bog down the system?

 

[Mike A.]

Some of the Dahua cams have parking detection as an AI feature but I've never tried it. Not sure what level of that is needed to, for example, alert on an empty spot vs alerting when something is detected in a spot. They have some cams that are specific to plate reading and parking lot management so I'd guess that those do.

Edit to add:
Also recall that some of the Dahua's have the option to detect when an object is removed from an area (missing object). That might work if the parking detection doesn't in the way that you want. Haven't used that either but looking at it, it doesn't seem to be looking for a specific object match (like, for example, face detection) but rather any object. So I'd think that it would alert if a car was removed from a given area.

 

[DsineR]

Possible to do this using Zone Triggers.
Ex. Zone A is the parking spot, Zone B area behind parking spot. Triggers & Alerts when object crosses Zone A -> Zone B, set object size & timing as needed.

 

[tofu]

Possible to do this using Zone Triggers.
Ex. Zone A is the parking spot, Zone B area behind parking spot. Triggers & Alerts when object crosses Zone A -> Zone B, set object size & timing as needed.

I'll give this zoning a try. I was hoping I wouldn't have to buy any new hardware

 

[Mike A.]

I think that may be hard to get to work well. With the back and forth of parallel parking likely will trigger both when cars pull into vs leave a spot? And I'm guessing that you're probably not watching a single space but a line of multiple spaces which further complicates things.

 

[tofu]

I think that may be hard to get to work well. With the back and forth of parallel parking likely will trigger both when cars pull into vs leave a spot? And I'm guessing that you're probably not watching a single space but a line of multiple spaces which further complicates things.

i'm watching a 3 car space and i have a "large" visual on the space, so i might be able to get it working. This would really be a huge quality of life improvement if i can

 

[Mike A.]

Yep, definitely can understand how that would be a useful practical automation and worth doing.

Not sure how you'd distinguish the typical back and forth using zones. If it were a pull-in kind of space, then between BI and HA you probably could set and track some variable as they pull in/out without too much trouble. Or if you had a single assigned space you're watching to make sure that nobody takes it. Harder with parallel and multiple spaces. Have to consider things like say having two open and the car pulling through one to park in the other, backing up into one to align better in the other, etc., etc. Make time I guess could help some. Curious to see how it works out.

 

[tofu]

This () looks brilliant, but is way over my head

 

[Mike A.]

That is very cool. Kind of along what I was thinking when I remembered the missing object mode for the Dahua AI. Instead of tracking what's there or coming in/out, look for when there isn't something there.

I need to go somewhere shortly. I'll set up the parking and missing object detection and test that quickly. Curious to see how that works now.

Edit to add:
Well, neither one worked. lol

From looking at a couple of videos, I believe that the parking only works when a car moves into an empty space.

For the missing object I tried a couple of things. A big box around the car and then another attempt with a box just a little larger than and around the front wheel. Neither triggered. Could be something that I'm missing in setting up or maybe that cam is too far away from the subject.

 

[tofu]

I have a zone set up right now on a cloned camera that just covers two parking spaces

Make time 10 sec
Large object size
Cars,trucks
Email on alert



This will obviously tell me when people both "leave" AND "park," but it's better than nothing -- if it works reliably. Quickly threw it together for testing. If it somewhat works, I'll try to fine tune.

Now to wait for someone to move

 

[MikeLud1]

I have a zone set up right now on a cloned camera that just covers two parking spaces

Make time 10 sec
Large object size
Cars,trucks
Email on alert

View attachment 131202

This will obviously tell me when people both "leave" AND "park," but it's better than nothing -- if it works reliably. Quickly threw it together for testing. If it somewhat works, I'll try to fine tune.

Now to wait for someone to move

You can also setup a schedule to only alert you the days and hours that you need to move your car.

 

[tofu]

So far, unsuccessful. Mainly just picking up alerts from people walking by, which fires because the vehicle no longer looks static as the person's body passes by it