Canberra to become Australia’s first electric recharge city
In another story on Canberra this week, it has been announced that our capital will become the first Australian city and only the third in the world to support electric cars, with an international company pledging to establish recharge points in the capital’s homes, workplaces and shopping centres within three years. The company facilitating the […]
Condor Towers Car Park
Last weekend’s social scene in Perth saw a relatively unique event on the calendar – the opening of the Condor Towers car park in Perth. Not usually something to make much of a fuss about? A while ago the developers of Condor Towers asked artist group OLOLO if they could ‘art up’ the 5 level […]
Parking officer survey reveals rising rate of abuse and assaults
We recently published a post about parking rangers, titled ‘The People vs The Parking Police’, which explored some of the consumer frustrations with parking police. On Tuesday (July 28), a report was published by the United Services Union exposing the other viewpoint – that of the parking rangers. The report, ‘Moving on for Safety’, publishes […]
Why advancements in fuel efficiency aren’t all that efficient
Courtesy of TreeHugger comes a report about vehicle fuel efficiency. This article, entitled ‘No wonder fuel economy is stagnant, cars ballooned up since 1980′, talks about how gains in the size, weight and horsepower in passenger cars have more than overcompensated for recent improvements in fuel efficiency. We found this excerpt to be most telling, sourced from […]
Pedestrian casualties in rush to bag a car park
Brisbane’s Courier Mail explores the increasing incidence of pedestrians being struck by drivers in busy car parks, desperate to beat other motorists to available parking bays. Compensation lawyers are getting in on the act too, and AAMI reports that as many as 70% of drivers have had bad experiences in shopping centre car parks, from damage […]
Colliers International Global CBD Parking Rate Survey 2009
Colliers International have just released their Global CBD Parking Rate Survey for 2009. The survey, which tracks 140 downtown parking districts around the world, found that Australia’s capital cities ranked among the most expensive places in the world to park. Sydney, Brisbane and Perth again all ranked in the top 10 cities globally for the […]
The people vs the parking police
There have been a lot of articles that have come to our attention this week about conflicts between parking inspectors, doing their job by the rule book, and affected and perturbed residents and car parkers, saying that ruling by the ‘letter of the law’ without any consideration for circumstance is unreasonable. We’ve found three interesting […]
Finding your car made easy by colour
This art project, ‘Color Coordinated Parking’ conducted at California’s Southwestern College in 1994, sorted over 3,000 cars into parking lots determined by the colour of the vehicle. It’s a brilliant conceptual idea as well as a potentially useful marketing tool… but would it help you find where you parked your white Toyota Corolla in a […]
NSW budget and implications on the parking and property industry
The NSW mini-budget was released on Monday June 15, with some interesting and relevant implications for the industry. Of course, the most notable feature of the mini-budget was a fiscal stimulus which will provide a temporary 50% cut to the stamp duty for people buying newly constructed dwellings, valued up to $600,000, until December 2009. […]
Station(ary) Parking
We read an article in the June 2009 edition of the British Parking Institute’s magazine titled “Is rail parking on track?” which addresses the issue of commuter parking at railway stations. Interestingly the article states that passengers leaving their cars at train stations is second only in the environmental stakes to getting there by public […]
European trends for road user charging and congestion charging
Based on a report by Frost & Sullivan, ‘Key Growth Trends in the European Markets for Road User Charging, Congestion Charging, Public Transport & Ticketing and Parking’, several notable trends appear to be emerging from the European (particularly Western European) market. As the usage of road tolls increases, the technology for the automatic tolling becomes […]
Sydney braces for impact of parking levy on July 1
With the NSW State’s increased parking levy due to come into effect from July 1, parking operators in Sydney claim that they will begin closing parking bays from next month, with the 110% tax increase rendering some parking spots economically unsustainable. Published in the Sydney Morning Herald on June 6, Bay Watch: parking operators’ fury […]
The car park of the future? Part 1.
Aptera Motors are a designer and manufacturer of efficient commuter vehicles – based on principles of aerodynamics and lightweight material innovation. They recently committed to producing 100,000 of their three-wheeled electric cars on the road over the next 5 years. One of their design team took a little bit of initiative to see what it […]
Street view fun
Google Street View has been launched in several countries around the world. You’ve probably heard about the town in the UK where residents are making news at the moment by protesting and blocking access to the town by the Street View car. Well, it’s not all sinister. Seen on the web this week are […]
Darwin International Airport case study
Darwin International Airport (DIA) requested PCI’s assistance with regards to the development of a parking strategy for the airport (passenger terminal, commercial and general aviation) over the next 20 – 25 years. This entailed identification of issues relating to the parking “offer”, both quantitative (size, product mix, pricing, location) and qualitative (look and feel). […]
Airport Monitoring Report 2007-08
In 1997, as a direct result of the privatisation of Australia’s airports, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) began a review of price regulation of airport services including the fee structure at airport car parks. Changes to the initial policy were put forward during the productivity commission review, which took place in 2002. Of […]
Getting a park before you even get there
Park Whiz is a US-based website that allows you to find and book car parking spaces, in advance. The focus of the business is on high-demand areas, such as airports, sports stadiums, theatre, concerts and events. Originally founded to help connect people who had spare parking with those in need, it’s also had some of […]
Getting electric: what it means for parking
As the hybrid revolution gains more and more momentum, the supporting infrastructure will need to adapt too. North Sydney Council claims it is on track to be the first in Australia to install electric plug-in stations to meet the growing demand and expected uptake of hybrid cars. North Sydney Councilor Trent Zimmerman: “Firstly we […]