A parking management system includes a parking facility management controller configured to allocate parking spaces at a parking facility as at least one of customer reserved spaces, handicap spaces, electric vehicle station spaces, premium spaces or unreserved spaces, the controller further including a communications unit configured to transmit the allocation of parking spaces to at least one video unit located at the parking facility. The video unit located at the parking facility, includes a video camera and video frame processing logic to process a video stream from the video camera while monitoring a parking space allocated by the controller, identify an event occurring at the allocated parking space, and encode a low bandwidth message characterizing the event. The at least one video unit includes a communications unit configured to transmit the low bandwidth message over low bandwidth communication links to the management controller.