Traffic congestion in parking lots is a common phenomenon across the world and larger commercial facilities with multiple parking areas may be particularly affected as many users struggle to gain access to sought-after parking spots close to their destinations. These popular zones often
see traffic jams forming as many vehicles arrive within these regions, while less popular areas may remain free from congestion. This creates a very uneven distribution of traffic, with motorists in popular areas becoming trapped and unable to leave bottleneck regions. As a result, the car
park management industry has taken an interest in research into parking guidance. Parking guidance has been developed to help improve efficiencies in car parks, guiding drivers to specific spaces using GPS technology to highlight free spaces near their location detailing the most efficient
way to get to that spot. Associate Professor Akira Kawai, who is based at Shiga University in Japan, has been working on a KAKEN project that seeks to leverage real-time positional information to help guide drivers to free spaces within parking lots.
An improved hierarchical A * algorithm in the optimization of parking lots
