The Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) will soon conduct a trial to test if parking offences can be detected in real time using vehicle-mounted cameras.

A URA spokesman said yesterday that the trial's objective is to study the feasibility of using video analytics on a moving vehicle to identify and classify various types of parking offences.

Such offences include parking along double yellow lines, against traffic flow, and in lanes with a single continuous white line across a bi-directional road.

The technology, expected to work under all weather and lighting conditions, should also pick up heavy vehicles parked in spaces meant for cars.

If the tests are successful, manpower deployed to nab offenders may in the future be reduced, as a single person will be able to drive the vehicle during enforcement operations. Such offences are currently verified physically.

Three components will be part of the enforcement vehicle - a video camera, a licence plate recognition programme, and an artificial intelligence engine that processes video footage and determines if a vehicle has been parked illegally, as well as classifies the offence.

The six-month trial, which will cover at least 15 roadside carparks in areas such as Tanjong Pagar and Little India, will begin in the second half of this year. Tests will be conducted on weekdays between 8.30am and 6pm, as well as between 7.30pm and 10.30pm.

The Straits Times understands that enforcement action will not be part of the trial.

In 2018, URA, the Land Transport Authority and the Housing Board appointed Certis as a common provider to carry out enforcement against parking offences in carparks and public roads managed by the agencies that are not equipped with electronic parking systems.

URA on Monday published a tender for contractors to conduct the trial, and submissions are open till 4pm on May 11.