The Northern Parking Powerhouse

The North East Parking Show celebrates innovation and best practice

Project Centre’s Nick Ruxton-Boyle with Sinead Cahillane of showcase winner PayByPhone

Project Centre’s Nick Ruxton-Boyle with Sinead Cahillane of showcase winner PayByPhone

Over 200 parking professionals from across the UK gathered at Newcastle Civic Hall last month to explore innovative approaches to parking management through a mixture of expert presentations, workshops and technology showcases. The North East Parking Show is a brand new event from Landor LINKS that has been designed to showcase the best in local authority parking and traffic management.

The event was programmed by the Newcastle Parking Services team working with Parking Review magazine. The day started with an introduction to parking in Newcastle by Parking Services team leader Steven Foster, who then introduced Cllr Nick Kemp, cabinet member for environment and enforcement at Newcastle City Council, who outlined the positive contribution that parking management and enforcement is making to the quality of life for citizens, businesses and visitors in Newcastle and the North East. Christine Herriot, director of operations and Regulatory Services, Newcastle City Council, then discussed the city’s approach to parking, events, schools streets, clean air, electric vehicles and community engagement.

A session on future trends in parking saw Clive Parsons, principal consultant at Urban Foresight, explain how the Newcastle-based smart city consultancy is helping local authorities and technology companies develop new approaches to mobility and electric vehicle infrastructure. Gareth Buchanan-Robinson, commercial director at RingGo, then looked at how smartphones are transforming the management of parking.

New systems and services were showcased at the Parking Innovations Showcase, an engaging and interactive session that brought together delegates and exhibitors. The showcase was entertainingly compered by Nick Ruxton-Boyle, technical director at Project Centre, who introduced four presentations:

• ‘Business intelligence’ by RingGo
• ‘Digital Innovation for Smarter Towns & Cities’ by Flowbird
• ‘Launching Chatbot Max’ by Barbour Logic
•  ‘Cashless parking for cleaner air’ by PayByPhone.

PayByPhone’s presentation, which described the Meters for Trees scheme, won the popular vote, with RingGo the runner-up.

The afternoon focussed on improving the parking experience. Louise Hutchinson, director of PATROL and Iain Worrall, stakeholder manager at the Traffic Penalty Tribunal (TPT), provided advice to help councils ensure motorists have access to an independent appeals service.

Rob Shoebridge, team manager, civil enforcement and parking services at Derby City Council, discussed using attended ANPR systems to reduce dangerous and anti-social parking at school gates.

Delegates were then able to take part in expert-led workshops on themes such as: cashless parking; setting parking tariffs; debt recovery; training and skills development; the Blue Badge scheme; and effective parking enforcement.
www.parkingshow.uk