In times of crisis – Innovation thrives

I received this note from Spot Parking’s CEO Elizabeth Zealand. If you have any innovation that has emerged during this crisis let me know…JVH

Code the curb company Spot Parking knows what it’s like to adapt. As a scale-up operating across the US and Australia, Spot feels fortunate to be an agile, tech-based company who can effectively work with customers remotely and give something back, no matter how small, in these difficult times.

To help support local businesses who can now only provide takeaway services, Spot partnered with a large Australian city to provide a COVID-19 interactive map, where the city can show the community new curbside restrictions to support pick-ups rather than parking, and local restaurants and pharmacies can communicate their new operating hours and offers to the local community.

Businesses that are still operating within the restricted guidelines need the ability for their customers to receive quick and safe curbside pick-up. Retailers such as supermarkets have introduced special trading hours for the elderly or vulnerable to be given priority service, and there was a need to communicate this along with the curbside restrictions.

“As a tech company, the ability to work on this with a city to help their citizens at this time has been an amazing experience, said Spot CEO Elizabeth Zealand. “It was the City’s innovative suggestion to adapt our current digital curbside and campus platform to allow for real time input from affected local businesses”

Drawing on Spot’s digital curbside mapping and visualization technology for cities, coupled with real time notifications of parking changes built for Ohio State University, the team were able to design and build the site within days.

“The Spot team are very used to working remotely as we are located across the US and Australia, but this was a new way of working for our city client, Elizabeth added.

“With so much of our industry in deep pain right now, this was a welcome innovation and our chance to play a small part in helping cities keep their local economy going whilst keeping citizens safe.”

JVH