People looking for a place to park around IU can now use an app to pay for their spot.
IU announced a new agreement Sept. 25 with the University and ParkMobile, a company that works with parking providers to allow mobile parking payments and reservation. Students, staff, faculty and visitors to campus can now use the ParkMobile app to pay for metered parking spots in select locations around campus.
“We feel like this gives an opportunity for folks not to have to rely on carrying coin around,” said Amanda Turnipseed, director of parking operations for the IU Bloomington campus.
Through the app, users can connect a payment option to their account, such as a credit card, Paypal or ApplePay, Turnipseed said. ParkMobile charges a 35 cent fee for any mobile transaction.
People who use the app to pay for their parking space can also extend their time if they can’t make it back to their meter. Turnipseed said this option only works for meters without a maximum time limit.
“There will still be that limitation based on the time limit that we have assigned to those various locations,” Turnipseed said.
Turnipseed said mobile payment is only an option at seven locations around campus with multi-space parking kiosks.
Currently, mobile payment is available at the corner of Sixth and Dunn streets, 10th Street and Indiana Avenue, the Residential Programs and Services office, Tulip Tree Apartments, Campus View Apartments, Redbud Hill Apartments and the Cyberinfrastructure Building.
Turnipseed said the University is interested in adding more mobile pay kiosks to campus in the future, although there is no official timeline for new installations at this time. She said as new kiosks are installed, ParkMobile payment will come with them.
“Our goal is to eliminate the older, dumb coin meters that are currently still on campus,” Turnipseed said.
