About a month ago, automated street sweeping alerts went live in San Francisco, and they were such a hit that today we’re now rolling them out in Chicago, too!
Why Chicago? Well, in 2013 alone, the city gave out a whopping 250,000 tickets during street cleaning season – that’s equal to $15 million in fines! We thought we could help make a big difference in Chicago area drivers’ experience of having a car – especially on this issue – so we decided to take action.
From today onwards, when you park in a zone where street sweeping will be taking place within 12 hours, we’ll send you an alert via email and push notification, as well as a reminder to move your car one hour before the sweeping begins. This frees you up from trying to decipher all those complicated signs – now you can get out of your car and go.
And just to further prove that we’ve got your back, on Wednesday, April 23rd, we’re offering to pay off street sweeping ticket that MetroMile customers have received since street sweeping started in Chicago on April 1, 2014!
All you have to do is bring us your ticket, show us the app installed on your phone, and we’ll give you cash – on the spot – to pay it off. Seriously!
We’ll be just outside The Tribune Tower at 435 N Michigan Ave. from noon to 3 pm CST to hook you up. Note that this promotion is limited to the first 100 MetroMile users who bring us their original tickets that have been issued in 2014, one per customer.
While we expect our new street sweeping feature to be super useful, we ask for your patience as we work out any kinks that come up. We may also ping you to fill out a quick survey to help us improve the experience, and thank you in advance for any and all input.
If you’re new to MetroMile but want to jump on board to start getting automated street sweeping alerts to your phone, here’s how:
1. Sign up for our Beta here. We’ll send you a free Metronome (a little plug-into-your-dash-and-go device that works with the MetroMile app).
2. Plug the Metronome into your car (1996 or newer).
3. Download the MetroMile app from the App Store and sign in.
It’s as simple as that. Once you’ve followed the above three steps you’ll get you the alerts, driving stats, car diagnostics, and a whole lot more. Happy to have you on board!