I had the unique opportunity to have the new parking system for Downtown Ellicott City explained to me by none other than the County Executive last night. We ran into each other at The Rumor Mill and he was excited to discuss this new feature of parking management.
Here is an explanatory video of the new program that will interact with your smart phone and other mobile devices:
There are certainly concerns about the program, most notably "What about those without smart phones?" and "So, I'm supposed to be swishing around a map on my iPhone while driving?", but those answers will come in due time. As someone with a smart phone (and not particularly skilled at parallel parking), I'm ready for the next gen in "parking technology".