Cheap parking phone application
Another phone application has recently launched: ‘Cheap Parking’ is designed specifically as an independent car park comparison app for Australia, New Zealand and Singapore. It covers all private operators including Secure Parking, Wilson Parking, Interpark and Grimes, as well as council, shopping centre, hotel and hospital car parks. The app allows you, the user, to factor […]
APC2010 Early Bird Deadline closes on Friday 3rd September
With the Australian Parking Conference approaching quickly (only 66 days to go!), a number of delegate and exhibitor opportunities are approaching their limits. The ‘Early Bird’ delegate ticket purchase deadline is this coming Friday September 3, saving $150 off a full delegate registration price and $100 off a day registration. To register now before this […]
Bike Park makes bicycle commuting easy
Bike Park is a new facility recently opened in the Melbourne CBD for storing bikes indoors. It offers a range of services to riders, including showers, lockers, fluffy towels, hair straighteners, ironing boards, fresh coffee, and even bike servicing. Riders can pay a casual (daily one-off) $10 fee to use the facilities; or become a […]
How close is too close?
Last week, Virgin Blue received a ruling from the ATO regarding fringe benefits tax on a Virgin Blue-subsidised staff car park two kilometres from Melbourne Airport’s terminal. Despite the distance, which takes staff 20-25 minutes to walk on less-than-ideal pedestrian facilities, the judge ruled that the car park was ‘in the vicinity’ of the airport, […]
Research ranks Australian cities as best and worst to drive
In research undertaken between December 2009 and January 2010, Virgin Car Insurance analysed Australian capital cities and Regional Centres on a number of key criteria to determine a ranking system for the ‘friendliest’ cities to drive in. Key criteria differed slightly between capital cities and regional cities, but both included data such as the average […]
Car sharing takes off in Australia
According to an article in the Australian Financial Review on June 1, several companies that offer car sharing and renting in Australia have seen the usage of car sharing services increase significantly in the past twelve months. Convenience and cost are the main driving factors for people joining car sharing companies, as well as consumers’ […]
Man stole $290,000 from parking meters
A Melbourne man has admitted stealing almost $290,000 from City of Melbourne parking meters in 2007 and 2008. He obtained the cash while working for a company contracted to collect the council’s parking revenue, National Protective Services. Nine workers involved in the scam would immediately pocket small amounts of coins extracted from the meters, while […]
Flaw in airport parking fines
Australian airports have been under increasing pressure of late in respect to the pricing of parking, following the release of the ACCC’s report into pricing and service levels in March. Last week, Transport Department officials discovered that about 70,000 parking infringements were issued at airports around Australia that are invalid, because the parking officer authorisations […]
The pitfalls of the bicycle in Sydney
In a timely follow up to last week’s post ‘The benefits of the bicycle’, John Pucher, a US academic from Rutgers University in New Jersey, says that Sydney is one of the world’s most hostile cities for cycling. Prior to publishing a paper in the Journal of Transport Geography, Dr Pucher claims that Sydney motorists […]
Car park costs reach new levels across Australia
Following on from our recent post ‘Are car park bays good investments?’, we thought we would republish some figures relating to how much car parks are selling for across Australia: are you sitting down? The record price in Australia is $240,000 for a single lock-up space in Brighton Boulevard in Sydney’s North Sydney CBD car […]
The benefits of the bicycle
Bicycle Victoria, a self-funded community organisation, has been working with the Victorian Department of Transport to integrate infrastructure for bicycle riders with the public transport network in Melbourne. As a result, the Department of Transport has recently rolled out free, undercover bike parking cages at stations across Victoria.Secure access is provided by a card system […]
Melbourne’s CBD parking demand grows and grows
Melbourne City Council recently released figures (Feb 3) on the state of parking in the Melbourne CBD area, analysing increases in demand and supply over the past four years. The number of people working in the city has grown by 40,000 in that time, and the resident population has increased by more than 4,000. In […]
No understand?
PCI’s roving reporters came across this sign during the week. On face value – it made us laugh, and could well be used by any number of disgruntled community groups to protest against the introduction of on-street parking meters. But, we’d like to get to the bottom of it! The post says it’s from Melbourne, […]
The people have spoken: show us where to park!
These are just some of the comments we received from people using the car park: “It’s great. We should have more car parks like this” “Drove straight in, looked for the green light, parked. Perfect!” “Love it!” If you’re interested in discussing Parking Guidance Systems, please don’t hesitate to contact us.
The Price of Parking at Airports
Cristina Lynn recently attended the 2009 Australasian Airports Landside Transport Conference (AALTC) in Townsville, Queensland, where she spoke on the topic of airport parking charges. Her presentation explores the economics of parking at airports, both in Australia and internationally, with data and examples of how pricing should be determined as well as a global comparison […]
Cars being rude to pedestrians in New York City
New York City at the moment is undergoing an urban planning evolution project, called ‘livable streets’. However, just because there’s an evolution underway doesn’t mean that drivers have gotten the message. Cars blocking crosswalks, drivers failing to yield to pedestrians, unnecessary honking and a slew of other quality-of-walking violations are still a routine occurrence on […]
The people vs the parking police – part two
In Logan City (USA) a recent council decision to replace the on-street parking strips with park-strips (small strips of park and greenery to improve aesthetics) has resulted in… a lawsuit. Residents of the area argue that the City initiated the park-strip project too quickly, and feel that the actions are outside their authority, invoking the […]
Oxford “Scramble” Circus
Courtesy of TreeHugger, we found this interesting article on the redesign of the pedestrian crossing at Oxford Circus in London, one of the busiest street crossings in the city. Modeled on the Japanese ‘scramble crossing’ design, as used in Shibuya station in central Toyko, the new design allows pedestrians thirty seconds to cross the intersection […]
Toyota designs a font using a car
This is a great idea for our more arty followers out there. Toyota has teamed up with two typographers and a race car driver to develop a font using only a car! The font is called IQ – the pictures tell a great story, but if you really want to be blown away, view the […]
Parking World magazine – October issue
The October issue of Parking World magazine is now out, and focuses on Airport Parking and Technology. There are a few mentions of PCI in this month’s issue, including the announcement of Kathy Ross’ appointment to PCI, and Cristina Lynn’s article about Sydney’s traffic challenge in the future, called Traffic Congestion – Sydney’s Paradigm Paralysis. […]
Traffic Congestion – Sydney’s Paradigm Paralysis
On returning from my overseas trip in July of this year I came across an article published in the (sydney) magazine entitled “I have a dream” which explored four different experts’ points of view regarding the state of our city: where did we go wrong and where do we go from here? This was quite […]
Melbourne developers push for reduced residential parking requirements
The City of Melbourne is currently considering a proposed amendment to the residential parking requirements for new developments in some central Melbourne districts. Under the proposed amendments, new apartment buildings constructed in these areas will not be required to provide any minimum number of parking spaces per dwelling. The Australian Financial Review reported on October […]