Design and Implementation of a Smart

Parking System

By

Kalu, Chidinma Nnekwu

14/EG/EE/909
&
Edet, Akan Joseph
14/EG/EE/925

Department of Electrical Electronic & Computer Engineering

Supervisor: Dr. Kingsley Udofia

December 2019
 Background of the Study
2
o Increasing number of vehicles plying Nigeria road

o Manual car parking system

o Economic loss

o Optimization of parking space

o Smart parking system

 Statement of Problem
3
o Improper parking of cars in a parking slot

o Insecurity of cars within a car park

o Clustered parking area leading to traffic jam

o Time spent in search of available slot

 Objectives of the study
4
Main Objective
To design and implement a smart parking system that will reduce
traffic congestion and ensure adequate security of cars within car
parks

Specific Objectives
o design an automatic slot checking system;
o design an automatic gate control system;
o develop a plate number extraction system ;
o develop an anti-theft system;
o design a billing system;
o design a proper parking mechanism; and
o Implement a prototype of the developed system
5
Significance of the study
o Enhancement of the parking system in places
such as libraries, malls, hospitals, offices,
churches, etc.
o Reduction of traffic congestion and economic losses
on most commercial places to a bearable level
o Ensuring security of cars and proper parking of cars
within the car park
6
Scope and Limitations
Scope
o Prototype implementation of the designed smart parking
system
o The parking system is for cars only

Limitations
o Smart cards for payment purpose was not considered
o The car can only be identified but not the car owner
o The car is not restricted from being parked in a slot that
is not allotted to it
 7
Review of Related Works
S/N Title
Automated Smart Car Parking
1.
System Shankar (2017)
Design and Implementation of
Smart Car Parking System Using
2.
Lab View Natarajan & Ghosh
(2018)
A survey on Intelligent Car
Parking System for Smart Cities
3.
Shah & Modi (2017)
Smart Car Parking System
4. Kepuska & Alshamsi (August,
2016)
Features
o Recognition of vehicle number Plate
using MATLAB.
o The GSM Module used to show
information about the car after
parking in a respective slot.
o myRIO as interface between parking
slots and display
o LabVIEW for data processing
o Smart Cars
o Intelligent Transport System (ITS)
o Intelligent Parking System Based on
Internet of Things.
o Detecting the presence of car in the
parking slot.
o wireless Xbee to communicate the
data collected from the slot to the
server
Limitations
Cannot be implemented for longer
distance; real time detection of cars
not considered
The system made use of Lab VIEW
which is unreliable and tends to
freeze and crash while handling
simple tasks.
The system can be implemented
using smart cars only.
It was not possible to test the result
physically for the test area. hence
for this work, the simulation tool
(XCTU) is used to demonstrate the
occupancy of the car park.
 Methodology
8
Start

New Car Arrival Billing System

Slot Checking System Car leaves Slot

Entrance Ga te Control Number Plate

System Extraction System

Number Plate
Car Authentication
Extraction System

Exit Gate Control

Car Registration
System

Proper Parking
End
Mecha nism

Figure 1: Flowchart of the system methodology

 Methodology…
9
Start

Av_Slot =
Maximum
available slot

Display
Av_Slot

Car at
Open gate Yes Av_Slot > 0? Yes Entrance
gate?

Av_Slot = Av_Slot-1 No
No

Car at Exit
No
gate?

Yes

Open gate

Av_Slot = Av_Slot + 1

Figure 2: Flowchart showing Automatic Slot

Checking System End
 Start
Methodology…
10
Start
No
GateSensor1
No
active?

GateSensor3
Yes
active?
No
Slot available
Yes
Yes
Display ³ STOP´ Update available slot
Open gate
No
No Car
Display ³ STOP´ Authentication
GateSensor1 GateSensor4
inactive? active?

Yes
Car Registration Open gate Yes
Yes
Update available slot

No Display ³ GO´ Close gate

Display ³ GO´
Gatesensor2
active? No
End
Yes
GateSensor3 End

Close gate
inactive?

Figure 3: Flowchart showing entrance gate Figure 4: Flowchart showing exit

control system gate control system
 Methodology…
11 Start

Start
Count = 0

Number Plate
extraction System
Take snapshot

No

Write Plate Number

Convert Image to Grayscale Count = Count + 1 No into RFID Card

Edge Object Detection

Count = 3?
Successful
Writing?
Rectangular cropping of Yes
number plate

Signal Operator Yes

OCR
Yes

Assign card to driver

Display Plate Number

End
Plate Number
Empty?

No

Figure 5: Number Plate Extraction System End Figure 6: Car Registration System
 Methodology…
Start

12
Count = 0

Start

Number Pl ate Ext raction

Read from card

No
Read from RFID c ard

Successful Readi ng? Calculate the bill

Yes

Number Plate M atching

Payment made

Yes Successful
Matching?

No No

Paid bill? Count = count + 1

End

Count = 3?

No
Yes

Figure 8: Flowchart showing

Yes Signal Security Billing System

End

Figure 7: Car Authentication System

 Start

Methodology… Count =0

13 SC = 0

Entrance gate control

Car registration

Car on the driveway

Car properly parked Yes Car parked on the No Car still on

Display ³ STOP´ Yes
on the slot? assigned slot? driveway?

No yes

Display ³ Keep Coming´ Count = (Count + 1) No

SC = SC + 1
Count = 60?

No
SC = 60? No
Yes

Yes

Signal Security Signal Security

End

Figure 9: Flowchart showing Proper Parking Mechanism

 Methodology…
14
RFID CARD/ BILLING
CAMERA GATE SENSORS
READERS UNIT

RFID MAIN GATE

CONTROLLER CONTROLLER CONTROLLER

PARKING
SLOT SENSORS GATE MOTOR
CONTROLLER

PATHWAY
ALARM DISPLAY
SENSORS

Figure 10: Block Diagram showing interconnection of various units

 Methodology…
15
Bill of Quantities of the Prototype
S/N Units Components Unit Cost (N) Quantity Cost (N)
1. Main controller MATLAB software - - 20,000.00
2. RFID controller Arduino Uno 6,600.00 2 13,200.00
3. Gate controller Arduino Uno 6,600.00 1 6,600.00
Arduino Mega 18,000.00 1 18,000.00
4. Parking controller Arduino Mega 18,000.00 1 18,000.00
Arduino Uno 6,600.00 1 6,600.00
5. RFID card/reader RFID card 180.00 6 1,080.00
RFID reader 1600.00 2 3,600.00
6. Camera Webcam 5,000.00 2 10,000.00
7. Gate Sensors IR sensors 600.00 4 2,400.00
8. Slot sensors Ultrasonic sensors 1000.00 6 6,000.00
9. Gate motor Stepper motors 1500.00 2 3,000.00
10. Alarm Buzzer 500.00 1 500.00
11. Display LCD 5,000.00 1 5,000.00
LED 20.00 16 320.00
12. Pathway Sensors IR sensors 600.00 4 2,400.00
13. Cars Toy cars 600.00 7 4,200.00
14. Construction Plywood - - 4,000.00
materials Connector cables - - 10,000.00
PVC trunking - - 3,000.00
Vero board - - 200.00
Resistors - - 200.00
Battery - - 100.00
Glue 500.00 5 2,500.00
Silicon gum 200.00 6 1,200.00
USB cable 500.00 5 2,500.00
Power cable 1,000.00 1 1,000,00
Adaptable boxes 1,000.00 2 2,000.00
Cardboard 200.00 4 800.00
15. Printing Layout printings - - 3,500.00
16. Logistics - - 60,000.00
Total 210,900.00
 Results
16
Construction of Prototype

Figure 11: Layout of prototype

 Results…
17
Gate Control System

(a) (b)

Figure 12: (a) Opening of entrance gate; (b) closing of entrance gate
 Results…
18
Anti-theft System: Car Registration

(a) (b)
Figure 13: (a) Snapshot of car front view; (b) plate number extraction and writing into RFID card
 Results…
19
Anti-theft System: Car Authentication

(a) (b)
Figure 14: (a) Failed plate number matching; (b) Successful plate number matching and payment
confirmation
 Results…
20
Proper Parking Mechanism

(a) (b)

(c)
Figure 15: (a) parking along the driveway; (b) improper parking at the slot; (c) proper parking
 Results…
21
Slot Checking System

(a)

(b)
Figure 16: (a) Available slot: 3; (b) Available slot: 0
 Conclusion
22
o A smart parking system with the ability to handle
improper parking, car theft, traffic congestion, slot
checking availability, and automatic gate control in a
car par was designed
o The prototype of the designed system was developed
and tested
o The tested prototype gave an accuracy of 100%