Towards people-centric cities with smart parking
Cities are increasingly focusing on creating public spaces for people, not for cars. As a result, they are reducing on-street parking spots. At the same time, many company buildings have an excess of parking spots for their own employees. Recent environmental regulations create an opportunity for building owners and tenants to cooperate with their city. With the right tools, they can use their parking lot as efficiently as possible while helping the city to become more environmentally-friendly.
Public spaces for people, not for cars
Many cities are reducing the number of parking spaces around office buildings to dissuade employees from taking the car to work. Their ultimate aim is to transition to more environmentally-friendly cities with bigger sidewalks, protected bike lanes, a focus on public transport, less traffic congestion and cleaner air. In short: public spaces for people, not for cars.
For this purpose, the city of Brussels has introduced the Ordinance of 2 May 2013 on the Brussels Code for Air, Climate and Energy Management (Cobrace). It concerns all off-street parking spaces in office buildings.
Excess of parking spaces
According to the ordinance, each office building is allowed a number of parking spaces based on the office floor area and the accessibility zone by public transport. The company has to pay a tax if it has more parking spaces than allowed.
Buildings in accessibility zone A are close to public transport. These are discouraged the most from having an excess of parking spaces, because public transport is a very accessible alternative there. Buildings in accessibility zone B are located further from public transport and are discouraged less. Buildings in accessibility zone C aren’t near public transport and hence are discouraged the least. These accessibility zones are continuously revised according to changing situations.
The problem is that many older buildings have an excess of parking spaces because real estate regulations required this at the time. Decade by decade, regulations required fewer and fewer parking spaces in office buildings.
Helping the transition towards a people-centric city
Fortunately, companies can be exempt from the Cobrace tax if they open their parking spaces to non-employees. This way, they help the Belgian capital in its transition to an environmentally-friendly, people-centric city. This is also interesting for companies with newer buildings, to use their parking spaces in the most efficient way.
However, transitioning your parking lot from an employee-only place to one that is also open to the public is quite a challenge. Cegeka can help you support the environmental goals of the city of Brussels and maximize your revenue streams at the same time by offering you a smart parking management system.
Smart parking management
Our Capacity platform is a smart electromobility solution for buildings that uses automatic plate recognition and smart logic to detect employee cars and ones driven by external drivers. The smart parking management system handles contactless digital payments for those external drivers. It’s also able to impose restrictions on the hours that you open your parking lot to the public, as well as handling other operational tasks. The platform is open and integrates with any existing hardware such as barriers, cameras, and smart building platforms.
Capacity also connects your parking lot to third-party parking resellers and apps, so drivers can easily see whether you have parking spaces available via their phone.
In close cooperation
The city of Brussels is at the forefront of this environmental trend. However, other cities will follow and implement similar policies. Cegeka is ready to implement a smart parking management system for your buildings, in close cooperation with the city, building owners and tenants.
Contact us if you want to find out more about our Capacity platform.