Get the text,
not the ticket.
The quick, easy, anonymous way to send or receive messages associated with your license plate.
@ca_ABC1234 you're blocking my driveway, can you move?
8:14
Sorry! Be right there!
8:15
SAN FRANCISCO · LAST 7 DAYS
parking issues a text message could have prevented.
5,977 of the tickets were for something a message could have pre-empted — a meter about to run out, a blocked driveway, a car about to be towed. Each one is a car whose owner would have moved it, if anyone had been able to tell them.
LIVE PARKING COMPLAINTS FILED WITH SF 311 · MATCHED TO VIOLATIONS A MESSAGE CAN PRE-EMPT
HOW IT WORKS
Scan, Send, Problem Solved.
Scan
Scan the plate. The camera reads it and drafts a message.
Send
Pick from the list or write your own.
Problem Solved
The message anonymously reaches the plate holder to take action.
MEANWHILE, IN THE GROUP CHAT
“Is this your car?” Guess what? The owner isn’t in the chat.
Parking is a top-three neighborhood complaint in America, alongside dogs and cats, and San Francisco is one of the three cities where residents struggle with it most. Every group eventually becomes a parking board.
58,735 NEXTDOOR POSTS, 50 CITIES · REGIONAL FOUNDATION REPAIR 2023 ↗NEW · PARKING GROUPS
Unless the car is in the group.
A parking group is a place and the people who park there — a building’s garage, a block, the lot behind a shop. Not a chat, and not a social network. One link gets you in, and every car on its list is a message away.
MAYA INVITES YOU
Join Elm Court Garage.
@plate lets neighbors reach a car’s owner through its license plate, without swapping phone numbers.
Join the groupNo car parked here? Join anyway.
01
Join by link
A neighbor passes you the group's link. Open it, tap Join — no form, no approval queue. No car needed: if you live in the building, it's your group too.
CHECK A PLATE
ITS HOLDER’S NOTE
Spot 12, weekdays.
That’s the whole answer. No name, no number, no other groups.
02
Check a car
Look up a plate and see whether it belongs here, with the note its holder left. Not who owns it, and not which other groups it's in.
CARS THAT BELONG HERE
TO 9DMK310
Through @plate, both ways. Neither side sees a number.
03
Message a car
Any car on the list is one tap from a message. It reaches whoever holds the plate, and the reply comes back the same way.
Already have a link from a neighbor? Just open it. You’re in with one tap — car or no car.
WHAT A GROUP WON’T DO
An invitation, not an index.
A list of cars in a place could be read as a register of who parks where. So here is exactly what is on it, and what isn’t.
READ THE POLICY ON GROUPS ↗- No bulk upload. There isn't one, and there isn't going to be.
- Every car is added one at a time. By its holder, or by someone who runs the group photographing it while standing at the group's address — one car, one photo. Either way, the holder can take it off.
- A car on the list names nobody. No name, no number, no owner.
- A check answers one question. Whether the car belongs here, and the note its holder left. Never who owns it, never which other groups it's in.
- Members see the cars their holders added. A car tagged by an admin's scan stays off the members' list.
- A link works for whoever has it. It can be forwarded, which is why whoever runs the group can reset it at any time.
FOR WHOEVER RUNS THE PLACE
Bring the building, not just your car.
Manage a building, captain a block, own the lot behind the shop? Start a group, name it, and hand out one link. Everyone who opens it is in.
Start a group — freeTHREE PROMISES, EACH CHECKABLE
Your plate is a mailbox, not your identity.
The whole point is reaching someone without learning anything about them. That constraint shapes the product, and every line below links to the policy paragraph that backs it.
Your number never leaves
Both sides get a token, never a number. Every message goes through @plate, so neither side ever sees the other's phone.
READ THE POLICY ON NUMBERS ↗We never say who owns a plate
Not to senders, not to lots, not to us. Every account is a verified phone number, and if two people claim the same car, its registration settles it.
READ THE POLICY ON OWNERSHIP ↗Documents are read once
Your registration is read in memory to match the plate, then discarded. Locations are blurred to a block.
READ THE POLICY ON DOCUMENTS ↗Better to be on it and not need it, than need it and not be on it.
Registering costs nothing and takes about a minute. Most people who do it never get a single message — and the one time it matters, it is the difference between a text and a tow truck.
Register my plate — free