Periodic Reporting for period 3 - Park4SUMP (Actions demonstrate how Park4SUMP will lead to achieve sustainable transport in urban areas by strategically integrating innovative parking management solutions into SUMP policies.)
Période du rapport: 2021-03-01 au 2022-08-31
Parking management is a very powerful tool to influence the demand for car use and to allocate public space in terms of people, active modes and public transport. In many cities in Europe and beyond, however, there has traditionally been a tendency to deal with parking problems in a reactive manner. When faced with a lack of parking spaces, for instance, cities simply responded by increasing the total supply of parking spaces. Such reactive policies have, amongst others, led to the preponderance of private cars that characterizes modern-day cities as well as to associated negative impacts on urban mobility and quality of life. Moreover, cities’ reactive parking policies also underline the observation that parking management currently is one of the most underdeveloped aspects of Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning (or SUMP).
Park4SUMP, an EU-funded Horizon 2020 project, aimed to change this. Park4SUMP intended to be a game-changer for urban mobility by strategically integrating parking management into SUMP. Such a strategic approach to parking management can help cities in gaining public and political acceptance, freeing up valuable public space, supporting local businesses, reducing parking search traffic, increasing road safety, supporting urban planning, making themselves more attractive to inhabitants and visitors alike and, finally, encouraging sustainable modal shifts. In this regard, Park4SUMP actively sought to contribute to European Green Deal ambitions and the EU Commission’s new Urban Mobility Framework.
Sixteen cities joined the project to demonstrate and transfer the various benefits of strategically and smartly managed parking. Park4SUMP helped these cities to achieve a broad roll-out of parking management best practices. It also stimulated further innovation in parking management, raised awareness and acceptance of new parking policies at different government levels, built capacity, and improved increased urban quality of life by alleviating parking pressure. Through Park4SUMP, all sixteen cities sought to dramatically improve their parking policies and establish parking management as a pinnacle of their respective SUMPs.
Park4SUMP, an EU-funded Horizon 2020 project, aimed to change this. Park4SUMP intended to be a game-changer for urban mobility by strategically integrating parking management into SUMP. Such a strategic approach to parking management can help cities in gaining public and political acceptance, freeing up valuable public space, supporting local businesses, reducing parking search traffic, increasing road safety, supporting urban planning, making themselves more attractive to inhabitants and visitors alike and, finally, encouraging sustainable modal shifts. In this regard, Park4SUMP actively sought to contribute to European Green Deal ambitions and the EU Commission’s new Urban Mobility Framework.
Sixteen cities joined the project to demonstrate and transfer the various benefits of strategically and smartly managed parking. Park4SUMP helped these cities to achieve a broad roll-out of parking management best practices. It also stimulated further innovation in parking management, raised awareness and acceptance of new parking policies at different government levels, built capacity, and improved increased urban quality of life by alleviating parking pressure. Through Park4SUMP, all sixteen cities sought to dramatically improve their parking policies and establish parking management as a pinnacle of their respective SUMPs.
Transferring and replicating Park4SUMP insights across Europe
Now the sixteen participating cities have put many of the Park4SUMP principles into practice, their insights can be shared across Europe. This will allow the positive project results to be transferred to and replicated in other cities.
“Integrating parking management into SUMP is feasible thanks to the ParkPAD audit tool”
The ParkPAD audit tool, developed by Park4SUMP, is incredibly useful for cities to get started with innovative parking management. Through co-creation with relevant local stakeholders, the tool enables a more strategic and participatory approach to parking policy planning, implementation and evaluation, allowing cities to structurally integrate parking management into their respective SUMPs.
“It all starts with regulated parking”
Park4SUMP estimates that 15-20% of smaller and medium-sized European cities still have no regulated parking in place. There is an enormous potential and immediate opportunity to introduce regulated parking and simultaneously integrate it into a SUMP.
“Public participation is vital for success”
Public participation in developing parking management measures is helpful for ensuring acceptance of and compliance with these measures. Public participation can take many forms, depending on a city’s local context.
Support from other levels of government
Dedicating revenues from parking fees and fines to investments in sustainable urban mobility and quality of life (so-called ‘earmarking’) may not be an option available to all cities at short notice. Often, this measure requires changes to national laws on funding mechanisms for local governments. A similar institutional barrier has been observed when changing minimum to maximum standards.
“Innovation can support effective and efficient enforcement”
Innovative tools can ensure more effective and efficient enforcement of parking rules and regulations. Innovation and digitalisation can also help improve the public reputation and personal job satisfaction of parking enforcement personnel.
“Cap parking spots for new buildings and developments”
Many cities, or even national laws, still require buildings and developments to provide a minimum number of car parking spots. This should be turned around: cities should implement a maximum cap on how many parking spots a building or development is allowed to provide.
“Don’t forget the soft measures”
When thinking about strategic parking management, do not forget accompanying push-and-pull measures to support behavioural change. Constructing Park & Ride facilities and cycling lanes while reducing parking supply in the inner city can push people towards more sustainable modes of transport. This, in turn, frees up public space and allows cities to create more liveable neighbourhoods.
Now the sixteen participating cities have put many of the Park4SUMP principles into practice, their insights can be shared across Europe. This will allow the positive project results to be transferred to and replicated in other cities.
“Integrating parking management into SUMP is feasible thanks to the ParkPAD audit tool”
The ParkPAD audit tool, developed by Park4SUMP, is incredibly useful for cities to get started with innovative parking management. Through co-creation with relevant local stakeholders, the tool enables a more strategic and participatory approach to parking policy planning, implementation and evaluation, allowing cities to structurally integrate parking management into their respective SUMPs.
“It all starts with regulated parking”
Park4SUMP estimates that 15-20% of smaller and medium-sized European cities still have no regulated parking in place. There is an enormous potential and immediate opportunity to introduce regulated parking and simultaneously integrate it into a SUMP.
“Public participation is vital for success”
Public participation in developing parking management measures is helpful for ensuring acceptance of and compliance with these measures. Public participation can take many forms, depending on a city’s local context.
Support from other levels of government
Dedicating revenues from parking fees and fines to investments in sustainable urban mobility and quality of life (so-called ‘earmarking’) may not be an option available to all cities at short notice. Often, this measure requires changes to national laws on funding mechanisms for local governments. A similar institutional barrier has been observed when changing minimum to maximum standards.
“Innovation can support effective and efficient enforcement”
Innovative tools can ensure more effective and efficient enforcement of parking rules and regulations. Innovation and digitalisation can also help improve the public reputation and personal job satisfaction of parking enforcement personnel.
“Cap parking spots for new buildings and developments”
Many cities, or even national laws, still require buildings and developments to provide a minimum number of car parking spots. This should be turned around: cities should implement a maximum cap on how many parking spots a building or development is allowed to provide.
“Don’t forget the soft measures”
When thinking about strategic parking management, do not forget accompanying push-and-pull measures to support behavioural change. Constructing Park & Ride facilities and cycling lanes while reducing parking supply in the inner city can push people towards more sustainable modes of transport. This, in turn, frees up public space and allows cities to create more liveable neighbourhoods.
Park4SUMP’s political impact: Gaining acceptance
Park4SUMP showed that gaining public acceptance for strategic parking management is key if local politicians want their parking plans and policies to succeed, and that acceptance can be achieved by:
• Gaining insight, through the project’s ParkPAD audit tool, into the quality and comprehensiveness of their current parking policy so a clear consensus can be reached on future parking management measures;
• Communicating about parking management measures in an objective and understandable way so as to explain their rationale as well as their expected benefits;
• Ensuring parking rules, regulations, fees and fines are reasonable, balanced and effectively enforced;
• Dedicating revenues from parking fees and fines to investments in sustainable urban mobility and quality of life so as to showcase the public that income from fees and fines is put to good use.
Park4SUMP’s socio-economic impact
Park4SUMP demonstrated that parking management can be a game changer in solving two of the core problems in urban transport:
It frees public space: 55.000 new parking places got regulated, 3239 parking sports were successfully re-allocated.
It solves the lack of financial resources (in SUMP) : minus 3239 parking spaces (x 750€ average subsidies per parking space/year saved) generates an income of + 2,4 mio.€. (In the lifetime of the project almost 10 mio €)
By re-investing (some of) the saved money into sustainable mobility there is a triple gain, because it pushes behaviour change, and ultimately supports SUMP broader policy objectives: accessibility, air quality, climate change, liveability…
Is among measures that restrain car use the most cost-efficient and acceptable (800 cities peer review)
Project outcomes: Park4SUMP - facts and figures infographic (illustration attached) provide a high-level overview of the work that was done and the results that were achieved within the duration of the project.
Park4SUMP showed that gaining public acceptance for strategic parking management is key if local politicians want their parking plans and policies to succeed, and that acceptance can be achieved by:
• Gaining insight, through the project’s ParkPAD audit tool, into the quality and comprehensiveness of their current parking policy so a clear consensus can be reached on future parking management measures;
• Communicating about parking management measures in an objective and understandable way so as to explain their rationale as well as their expected benefits;
• Ensuring parking rules, regulations, fees and fines are reasonable, balanced and effectively enforced;
• Dedicating revenues from parking fees and fines to investments in sustainable urban mobility and quality of life so as to showcase the public that income from fees and fines is put to good use.
Park4SUMP’s socio-economic impact
Park4SUMP demonstrated that parking management can be a game changer in solving two of the core problems in urban transport:
It frees public space: 55.000 new parking places got regulated, 3239 parking sports were successfully re-allocated.
It solves the lack of financial resources (in SUMP) : minus 3239 parking spaces (x 750€ average subsidies per parking space/year saved) generates an income of + 2,4 mio.€. (In the lifetime of the project almost 10 mio €)
By re-investing (some of) the saved money into sustainable mobility there is a triple gain, because it pushes behaviour change, and ultimately supports SUMP broader policy objectives: accessibility, air quality, climate change, liveability…
Is among measures that restrain car use the most cost-efficient and acceptable (800 cities peer review)
Project outcomes: Park4SUMP - facts and figures infographic (illustration attached) provide a high-level overview of the work that was done and the results that were achieved within the duration of the project.