A council committee in Washington DC has approved a plan to allow city officials to manage the demand for parking spaces by adjusting parking prices, taking inspiration from San Francisco’s SFpark program.

Under the plan, city officials would be able to adjust parking meter rates, length and times of operations, parking fines and residential parking regulations. Called ‘performance parking,’ the program has been tested throughout the city in recent years. The Washington Post reports that the parking plan also directs that money raised by the program be used locally to improve bus services and to foster the use of alternative transportation.

According to the DCdot site, performance-based parking manages the demand for parking to achieve three key elements:

1. Protect resident parking: Higher kerbside parking meter rates combined with more stringent parking restrictions in residential neighbourhoods in the pilot areas help preserve kerbside parking for residents in areas where business or entertainment uses draw lots of visitors.

2. Protect businesses: Performance based meter rates and time limits are designed to encourage brief kerbside parking with high turnover while discouraging long-term parking that would deprive businesses of customers. Visitors with long-term parking requirements are encouraged by the higher meter rates to utilize off-street parking facilities.

3. Promote non-automotive transportation and reduce congestion: Higher kerbside meter rates encourage walking, biking and transit use in lieu of auto travel in congested places.

An online Russian newspaper ‘The Village’ has launched an app and a media campaign designed to try and stop illegal and inconsiderate parking.

Using the app on a mobile phone, the public take photos of the parking offenders, capturing photos of the car and the number plates. Image recognition technology then reads the number plates to identify the driver of the vehicle.

Then, the name of the driver, along with photos of their car, are published to the newspaper’s website, on banners and media placements; as well as allowing people to post the details to their own facbeook pages as well; naming and shaming the drivers; with a message ‘Share to remove’ (the poor parking).

It’s an interesting way of crowd-sourcing and social shaming for poor parking, and will be very interesting to see if it has any effect. We’re not too sure about the name for the application, however – the Parking Douche App. Find out more in the video below. 

Introducing Park4U: an iOS / Android app that delivers ‘assisted parking’ by remotely parking your car.

According to Engadget, the system is currently available on a limited number of Volkswagen-group models including the Touran, Sharan, Audi A6, Audi A7 and the Seat Alhambra. The company is planning to have 38 models equipped with the tech by year's end. See it in action below.

Colliers International, in conjunction with Parking & Traffic Consultants, have released a white paper into CBD car parks in Australia.

The paper, entitled Australian CBD Car Parking – The Next Decade, examines the current trends and the expected future of car parks in Australia. With the number of car spaces in Australian CBDs increasing only marginally from 141,690 in 2006 to 153,400 in 2011, car parking is a finite product, with the supply of car parking expected to moderate over the next decade.

A key finding of the report was that the ratio of car parking to CBD workers is declining, along with the importance of parking relative to other forms of transport. Since 2005, proximity to public transport has remained the most important driver in attracting and retaining staff by tenants when choosing an office location and has steadily increased in importance over time.

Real estate and property yields for well-established commercial car parks are generally slightly above commercial buildings in the same price range in comparable locations, with a slight risk premium factored in to allow for increased uncertainty surrounding changes to Government legislation, casual parking as a discretionary spend which generally diminished in times of economic uncertainty, and a smaller market for car parking assets.

Parking & Traffic Consultants' own Managing Partner, Cristina Lynn, was a co-author to the report. Cristina said that with changes to technology and the cost of car parking on the rise, owners had to become more innovative in the services they provide. The benefits of new technology coupled with greater awareness of customer’s needs should ensure on going profitability and value maximisation for car park owners.

Click here to view the full white paper.

We came across an interesting article which explores the pre-booked parking phenomenon and why it is commonplace in the UK – accounting for around 20% of airport parking – but almost non-existent around the rest of the world. 

The article’s author, Chris Wortley, asserts that the practice came about from two factors: high prices at airport parking locations and a consumer belief that these prices were too high. Enter a range of competitive players, opening ‘off airport’ car parks at reduced rates. As these competitors had no visibility, hey had to advertise online and in doing so started to take bookings online. Airports started to see their car parking revenue fall and to compete had to introduce their own pre-booking solution.

Online aggregator services (think Webjet) also saw an opportunity and moved to become the one-stop shop for ‘off airport’ car parks – further increasing competition and eroding airport’s parking revenue.

Should operators and airports in Australia be concerned? It seems so, with the UK consolidator sites beginning to spread their reach to Germany and the US as they become part of the online travel booking process, bundling together flights, parking, insurance, car rental and VIP business lounge services all into the one transaction.

It’s certainly an interesting model and may require airports to consider a different way of doing business. Time will tell when and how it rolls out in Australia, but at least there is interesting data and case history available from UK services and operators to draw from.

Near field communication (NFC) technology allows secure data to be transmitted from a device or object to exchange information or even conduct electronic transactions with a tap. The technology is already embedded in many chip credit cards, and mobile phone providers are moving to roll out handsets which are NFC enabled, allowing users to pay with the tap of a mobile phone. (For more information, refer to our previous Wayfinding Forum posts, ‘Mobile cashless payments by card and phone’, and ‘Google Wallet’s potential effect on parking industry infrastructure’).

Technology site ARN recently polled global mobile industry experts to find that eighty one percent expect that NFC technology will be widely used and adopted for mobile payments in two to five years time. Of these executives, 38 per cent believe consumer concern over security of personal financial information exchanged during mobile transactions is the leading obstacle to large-scale adoption of mobile payments.

They are not wrong, according to UK media site The Drum, which claims that research conducted by VoucherCodes.co.uk has found that most consumers don’t know about NFC technology, and 60% would avoid paying for goods and servies via their mobile even if they were able. A further 17% were interested in the technology but worry about how it works.

VoucherCodes has created a really interesting infographic which attempts to explain the NFC technology and quantify the results of their survey. You can view this in full size by clicking here or on the image below. 

An article published in the SMH recently explored what they considered a new phenomenon: parking space ‘squatting’, whereby drivers returning to their cars will sit in the vehicle to use their phones to talk, text or email.

On the one hand, it’s upsetting the normal ‘order’ of things – with the driver expected to vacate the in-demand space instead causing aggravation to other drivers looking for their own parking space. Following a driver back to their vehicle in a packed car park is now no longer a guarantee of securing the spot immediately.

On the other hand, however, safety advocates are pleased to hear that people are using their phones when the vehicles are stationary, saying that perhaps this is the first sign that attitudes are shifting around distracted driving. Driving and using a mobile phone without a handsfree unit is illegal in Australia, and more and more states in the US are banning drivers from texting, with private companies also forbidding employees to use their phone while driving. Drivers are instead pulling over to a safe place to talk, text and email.

It’s an interesting debate and it’s encouraging to see drivers adapting and becoming more conscious of safety. And besides, if the driver has paid for the time for the parking space, aren’t they entitled to use it in any way they wish?

The NSW government has recently changed legislation for on-street parking, paving the way for the introduction of ‘phone parking’.

After registering their details with a third party operator, drivers would then either use a smartphone application or call a toll-free number to send their car registration details to the system, advising of their arrival in the space. The “meter” is then stopped again by the driver on return, and the parking fees billed to their credit card. The system alerts the driver by text message 15 minutes before their paid parking time expires.

According to Fairfax Media, the NSW Roads Minister, Duncan Gay, said the change has been agreed to by Roads and Maritime Services, with the phone parking to complement existing payment methods.

The system should prove popular with local councils as it will reduce the costs of parking meter maintenance. Proponents of the technology claim that it benefits drivers by removing the risk of overpaying the meter, and reducing the risk of overstaying. 

Volvo has recently announced a world first in the introduction of a new safety technology it calls Pedestrian Detection.

According to ZDNet, it's part of Volvo's IntelliSafe system that, in the first instance, will brake sharply if someone steps in the way. If the car goes on to hit someone, an external airbag on the bonnet inflates to cushion the blow.

The external airbags will be part of the Volvo V40, which already has a number of handy features, like helping drivers stay in their lane, park assist capability to help drivers with reverse parking, and Driver Alert Control to warn when the driver is getting tired.

The only drawback with the external airbags is that they only work effectively at speeds up to 35km/h. However if it prevents injuries for pedestrians, it’s definitely worthwhile technology!

Below are videos showing the operation of the external airbags, and a second video on the Pedestrian Detection technology in general.

We have come across two technological innovations this week from auto manufacturer Mercedes that are pushing the boundaries in parking and driving.

The first sees the integration of Apple’s voice recognition technology (called ‘Siri’) into their vehicles, allowing users to access their iPhone and applications through voice commands. According to Discovery.com, the system will transfer the phone’s screen to the car's system screen so that drivers can listen to music, update social networks statuses and send texts.

The second innovation is called ‘Mercedes TweetFleet’, and sees a fleet of cars that include a new feature, alerting you when there is a car parking space free as you drive past. To make people aware of the new feature, they developed a smart campaign that featured a fleet of cars that tweeted when they came in proximity of a free car space. View more on this video below.