13th Australian Parking Convention is a resounding success
Following in the steps of the November 2010 Convention, the Parking Association of Australia held its 13th event at the Sydney Convention and Exhibition Centre earlier this week. The event was characterised by a high level of local and international speakers that had the delegates particularly riveted to their seats. The exhibiton, in Hall 6 […]
Smart paint lights your way on the highway
The Netherlands is introducing a form of ‘smart highway’, featuring glow-in-the-dark tarmac and dynamic paint that warns drivers of weather conditions. The roads will include interactive lighting and an induction priority lane for electric vehicles, with the aim of using light, energy and road signs that automatically adapt to varying traffic conditions. The design and concept […]
Can the bicycle save the high street?
Following an article we published in March, Why cyclists are better customers for local businesses, we recently came across another article that also found that cyclists and pedestrians tend to spend more money in local economies. According to TreeHugger, both Portland, Oregon and New York’s East Village have found that streets that promote cycling and […]
Sydney’s George Street : what does it look like with light rail?
The City of Sydney has put forward a proposal to contribute to the NSW State Government’s light rail project, transforming George Street into a world-class main street. Council has offered to work with the NSW Government by committing $180 million to the light rail project, including funding new pedestrian spaces, new information signage, upgraded public […]
Car sharing: data shows it may be working
The city of Hoboken, New Jersey, introduced a car sharing scheme over two years ago; based on the assumption that they would create parking spaces by taking them away. According to the New York Times, 42 of the city’s roughly 9,000 on-street spaces were allocated to the car sharing program upon inception. Survey data shows […]
Gambling with one’s life on city roads
And it’s not just the developing countries that are having issues with too many cars on the roads. A letter to the Sydney Morning Herald recently highlighted the changes in Sydney’s traffic and drivers’ attitudes. The author, Nestor Lexa, used to ride a bicycle, but on noticing that car drivers were becoming more and more […]
Driving versus riding your bike: a cost calculator
How much exactly does it cost to ride a bicycle instead of driving a car? There’s an answer for that, and it’s personalised to your own usage. The Saving Electricity site has come up with a biking vs driving calculator, that lets people plug in their own data to calculate how much they are able […]
Sydney’s public transport infrastructure solutions
As Sydney’s population grows, so too has the demand for supporting infrastructure, particularly between the city and the suburbs. Two initiatives announced this week aim to try and address this demand through increased capacity. The NSW Transport Minister announced last week the return of double-decker buses to Sydney’s roads, as part of a trial to […]
Sydney’s CBD bike path debate continues
Whilst on the subject of bikes, according to a number of expert reports obtained by the Sydney Morning Herald, the controversial bicycle lanes in Sydney’s CBD have made little to no impact on the city’s general traffic congestion. The consensus amongst traffic experts is that congestion continues as no car traffic lanes have been removed […]
Cycle-tecture in urban landscapes
A guest post from our Senior Traffic Consultant, Andrew Morse. Will the bicycle influence our future streetscapes? It’s not such a strange question when considering how the car influenced not only our streets, but our architecture too. In fact, according to Dr Steven Fleming, Professor of Architecture at the University of Newcastle, there are architectural […]
Mayor turns his parking space into a park
A nice story this week that perhaps takes some inspiration from the annual Park(ING) day. The mayor of Ithaca, NY, Svante Myrick, has given up his car to join the estimated 15 percent of the city’s residents who walk to work. According to the Grist List, the mayor is entitled to a reserved parking spot […]
Parking policy and practice – a UK report
A report released in July by the UK’s Royal Automobile Club (RAC) has detailed British parking policy and practice. Called “Spaced Out: Perspectives on parking policy”, the 113 page report offers a huge depth of data on the industry. The report focuses on the demand and supply of parking, with a particular emphasis on the […]
The future of car commuting
We came across a great article this week on The Atlantic Cities, exploring the future of car commuting, and in particular, the development of the ‘road train’ – a semi-autonomous highway platoon that follows the movements of a human-driven lead car. A trial for the road train was conducted in June outside Barcelona, Spain, in […]
Hate to wait: Heathrow pods experienced first hand
Reporting on-location, our London correspondent recently filed a report on the electric pods at Heathrow airport, shuttling passengers from the business car park to Terminal 5 (see also our previous stories on the pods, Pods from the car park at Heathrow Airport, and Heathrow airport pods are now in motion). Some of the key features […]
Now we know what to do with those old meter posts!
An interesting article appeared in July’s edition of The Parking Professional (official publication of the International Parking Institute) which follows the results of a 2008 competition set up by New York City’s Department of Transportation (DOT) in partnership with the Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum for a unique NYC bicycle rack. The objective of the […]
Cycling in London: an entirely different sort of pursuit event
You may be accustomed to reading Lionel Shriver fiction and even seeing some of her more renowned work on the big screen (We need to talk about Kevin). However, she has recently taken up her pen for The Atlantic Magazine to express her personal disappointment with London’s cyclists. She offers an interesting view point, as […]
Britain’s most bike friendly universities
The UK’s Telegraph published a great gallery of their top 10 most bike-friendly universities. We thought we would conclude this week’s blog posts with a selection of three of our favourites (of the top ten) below. At No. 10: Oxford University (image in heading above) offers 2,900 bike spaces dotted around what is the UK’s […]
Australian Parking Convention 2012 – registrations now open
A message from Cristina Lynn, Parking & Traffic Consultants’ Managing Partner.< As you may be aware the biennial convention organised by the Parking Association of Australia will be held on 11 – 13 November 2012 at the Sydney Convention and Exhibition Centre. Similarly to the event held in 2010 the Exhibition will be occupying Hall […]
Technology and innovation key trends in IPI survey
The 2012 Emerging Trends in Parking Survey from the International Parking Institute (IPI) has seen increased demand for technology-related innovations account for half of the top ten trends in today’s $30 billion parking industry. Among these trends include, cashless, electronic, and automatic payment systems; real-time information about parking rates and availability via mobile apps; and […]
Electric Vehicle charging in Europe
A report released by Pike Research (now stored in web archives) into the deployment of Electric Vehicle charging infrastructure across Europe has forecasted that by 2020 there will be more than 2.9 million plug-in electric vehicles on Europe’s roadways, and the region will have more than 4.1 million electric vehicle charging stations installed. The EV […]
Road pricing may be the answer to transportation funding
In an article published on the Australian Financial Review recently, transport consultant John Cox claims that the potential introduction of road pricing is much needed with discussions going on under the surface. One of the biggest driving factors in the examination of road pricing has been the realisation that the congestion issue in Australian cities […]
Airport Operations 2012 Conference
The second annual Airport Operations Conference will be held in Canberra in September this year. The conference is the only event addressing operational challenges and opportunities in airport development, and will take a close look at current trends, as well as offering a site tour of Canberra Airport. The key issues to be covered at […]
Ford develops Traffic Jam Assist technology
Ford has announced that it is developing “Traffic Jam Assist”, an intelligent driving feature that employs technology from the already-available active Park Assist, Adaptive Cruise Control, Lane-Keeping Aid and the PowerShift transmission to enable a vehicle to automatically keep pace with other vehicles on the road, using radar and on-board camera technology. It also provides […]
Pango mobile parking service launches in US
The Israeli-founded app “Pango”, designed to help with city parking and cruising, has launched in the US, together with their first so-called ‘smart garage’ in New York. Once users install the app and create their account using their license plate number and credit car details, they are able to search for participating parking stations. On […]
Urbanized: A must see for all Urban Designers (real or otherwise!)
Urbanizedis a feature-length documentary about the design and development of cities, which looks at the issues and strategies behind urban design and features some of the world’s foremost architects, planners, policymakers, builders, and thinkers. According to the film’s press release, over half the world’s population now lives in an urban area, and 75% will call […]
Bicycle infrastructure funding far from priority
An article published in The Conversation this week provides a comprehensive assessment of the benefits and costs associated with state governments’ transport policies. They claim that governments across Australia have been slow in investing in the areas that deliver maximum benefit for least cost. A recent example of this mismatch is the Victorian Government’s decision […]
Canberra Airport plans to build high-speed rail station
Canberra Airport has unveiled plans to build a A$140 million high-speed rail facility next to its new airport terminal, in a bid to transform the gateway into a multi-modal hub and eliminate the need for a second Sydney airport. According to a federal government study, a high speed rail link between the two cities would […]
UK pilots electric-only car share scheme
A car sharing group in the UK will be the first in the country to exclusively use electric vehicles. The scheme, run by Sustainable Venture Development, will be piloted in north Oxfordshire. According to BBC.co.uk, the cars will have dedicated bays on the street, beside which there will be specific fast-charging infrastructure installed, ensuring that […]
Parking news from around Australia
In a quick summary of other news from around the parking and traffic world this week, the press is once again taking aim at airports, this time comparing the cost of parking a car to the cost of parking a plane. The article compares the base rates for parking against each other (finding that it […]
Leicester opens bicycle park
A secure cycle parking facility in the centre of Leicester has been reopened under new management after a year-long refurbishment programme. The Bike Park, which is located beneath Leicester Town Hall, incorporates showers, lockers and a bike shop as well as parking spaces for 110 bikes. According to the BBC, the premises were refurbished at […]