Parking Birmingham - Smart City Occupancy Dataset

Overview

The Parking Birmingham dataset contains occupancy measurements from multiple car parks operated by NCP (National Car Parks) in Birmingham, UK, as part of the city's smart parking infrastructure.

Data Collection

• Data collected from October 4 to December 19, 2016, during operating hours (approximately 8:00 AM to 4:30 PM).
• Measurements taken every 30 minutes using IoT sensors that detect parking spot occupancy.
• Multiple parking areas (identified by SystemCodeNumber) monitored throughout the city.

Variables

• SystemCodeNumber: Unique ID code for each parking area/car park.
• Capacity: Total number of parking spots available in that area.
• Occupancy: Number of parking spots actually occupied at the time of measurement.
• LastUpdated: Timestamp of the observation (date and time).
• Derived fields: PercentOccupied (ratio of occupancy to capacity), DayOfWeek, and rounded half-hour timestamps for aggregation.

Data Quality

• Some raw occupancy values exceed capacity or are negative; data cleaning is required to constrain occupancy to the range [0, Capacity].
• After cleaning, PercentOccupied values range from 0% to 100%.

Use Cases

• Time-series forecasting of parking availability for smart city applications and driver assistance systems.
• ARIMA and SARIMA modeling to predict when and where parking will be available.
• Urban planning and parking management optimization based on occupancy patterns.