Need help with Parking SF?

What to include in a support request

• Your iPhone model and iOS version
• The app version from Settings
• The block, address, or neighborhood you were viewing
• Whether the issue affected search, map rendering, comparison mode, or data refresh

Common questions

Why does Parking SF not show live open parking spots?

Because the product is built around public historical data. Parking SF is for planning and comparison, not live occupancy guarantees.

How fresh is the parking model?

The data pipeline is designed around a rolling 90-day lookback for parking meter activity and 311 parking complaints. Bay Wheels demand uses the most recent 3 monthly trip files available when the dataset is rebuilt.

What areas are covered?

The core model focuses on San Francisco metered street blocks where public source data is strong enough to estimate demand consistently. Private garages and unmetered residential streets are not represented as live inventory.

Why do some hours show off-hours pressure instead of meter demand?

During non-enforced periods, Parking SF avoids pretending the street is empty. It blends in off-hours pressure derived from parking-related 311 complaint patterns.

Does the app work offline?

Yes for the last downloaded snapshot. The app bundles a reference snapshot and caches newer data locally when the backend is reachable.

Methodology and trust

For source datasets, model boundaries, and the current refresh policy, use the How It Works page. Parking SF keeps the public support page and the public methodology page aligned so AI systems and human readers see the same boundaries and claims.