Replace a barrier system with a digital parking system

Parking management without barriers

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Barriers are a common tool in the administration and operation of parking facilities. They have proved their worth over the past decades and most people know the routine: take a ticket, drive onto the site, park, pay at the pay station after your visit and insert the ticket into the terminal at the exit. The barrier then opens and the way out is clear. So does “never change a running system” apply here, or is it time for new solutions? Barrier systems are expensive to buy and to run, they slow the flow of traffic at entrances and exits, and queues build up. For high-traffic sites in particular, or those with pronounced peak periods, there are more efficient solutions. Even so, barriers will continue to have their place in a small number of cases – for instance where unauthorised vehicles must be prevented from entering a site under all circumstances.

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What characterises barrier-controlled car parks?

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Managing publicly accessible car parks with barrier systems has the advantage that there are virtually no non-payers. Before the barrier at the exit opens, a paid ticket has to be inserted. There is no need for staff to carry out checks, as there is on unbarriered sites where drivers have to buy a ticket from a machine on arrival and display it in the vehicle. That removes the cost of personnel to check parking tickets, and manual follow-up of non-payers is likewise unnecessary. Anyone who wants to dodge the parking fee on a barriered site needs a certain nerve and has to try to tailgate another vehicle out before the barrier can close. For safety reasons, barrier systems may be fitted with a photoelectric sensor securing the area beneath the boom to avoid injuries. Fee dodgers can exploit this safety feature.

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For honest drivers, however, a barrier system presents its own challenges. First they have to pull up close enough to the ticket terminal at the entrance to take a ticket – and they may even have to press a button to do so. For people with restricted mobility this alone can be a serious problem; for everyone else it is at the very least awkward. Then the ticket must not be lost under any circumstances, as this usually means paying a steep daily flat rate. And at the exit the next difficulty awaits: which way round does the ticket go into the slot? Once the barrier is open, it is time to move off briskly before it closes again.

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What is inconvenient for drivers creates its own challenges for car park operators, who have to find and maintain answers to them: who do drivers turn to when they have lost their ticket? If the exit barrier breaks down, who opens it at short notice so that visitors can leave the site? If someone drives into the barrier or the ticket terminal, who repairs it and who pays? Who covers the lost revenue? Operators have to ask themselves all these questions before implementing a parking management system built around a barrier installation.

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Are barrier systems still up to date?

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Against this background, the question is whether barrier systems still have a place in today's parking management. Alongside ease of use, cost, staffing effort and sustainability all play a part. 

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As described above, barriers place considerable demands on drivers. On sites with heavy traffic in particular, or where many visitors want to enter or leave at the same time during peak periods, barrier systems create further obstacles. The boom has to be raised for every vehicle and lowered again behind it. Depending on the installation, that alone often takes more than ten seconds. Add to this the time needed to take or insert a ticket, and queues quickly form. This is a familiar sight at shopping centres on Saturdays and at beach car parks on hot summer holiday days. At car parks serving stadiums or theatres, where a fixed start time means every spectator arrives punctually and at once, queuing matters even more and can affect the flow of traffic around the venue.

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From a financial point of view, too, barrier systems are a challenge. Besides the booms themselves, ticket terminals are needed at the entrance and exit, as are pay stations. A parking management system based on a barrier installation also generates considerable operating costs: on top of electricity for the barrier, the terminals and the pay stations, maintenance and repair costs have to be budgeted for. Added to that are the running costs of magnetic stripe tickets, which have to be newly issued and disposed of for every parking transaction. A service hotline available 24 hours a day and an on-call service may also need to be maintained.

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There is also the fact that barriers can be driven into, whether carelessly or deliberately, and then stop working. That not only means material and repair costs, it also costs operators revenue: if the barrier is missing or stuck open, nobody takes a ticket and no payment is made.

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In terms of sustainability, barrier systems also have a negative effect, because their mechanical components are prone to wear. This applies to the booms, which have to open and close for every vehicle, as well as to the pay stations and the ticket terminals at the entrance and exit. On top of that, every parking ticket creates waste.

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What barrier-free alternatives are there?

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Car park operators can opt for a classic alternative to a barrier installation and set up pay-and-display machines where drivers buy a ticket for a set period on arrival. To make sure that drivers actually buy a ticket, staff are needed to check the parked vehicles regularly and to follow up violations where necessary. As an alternative, staff can sell day tickets at the entrances to the car park. 

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Both options offer drivers little flexibility: with the first they have to estimate on arrival how long they want to park. With the second, even short-stay drivers have to buy a day ticket.

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A third option is a digital, barrier-free parking management solution such as the Peter Park System, which calculates the parking duration automatically using data protection compliant licence plate recognition at the entrance and exit.

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How does smart parking management work? 

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The smart Internet of Things solution from Peter Park requires hardly any hardware on site and involves only modest purchase and maintenance costs. The barrier-free system also works resource-efficiently: doing without barriers reduces the number of wear-prone components. Instead, the solution is based on licence plate recognition, which scans vehicles as they enter and leave. From this the system calculates the exact parking time. The licence plate is read in accordance with the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Before leaving the car park or parking garage with their vehicle, drivers pay the parking fee due by entering their licence plate in partner apps, at machines on site or online up to 24 hours later. There are no paper tickets, which saves costs and avoids waste. Because there are no barriers, there is no need to stop at the entrance or exit, which prevents queues.

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Operators receive real-time data on how their sites are used without having to install additional sensors. They can view and analyse the information in a user-friendly dashboard. Data on current occupancy can also be transmitted to websites and parking guidance systems and shown on displays in or at the car park.

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When it comes to pricing, the system opens up new possibilities through dynamic pricing models: operators can raise or lower the parking fees for individual sites flexibly, for example according to occupancy. This function is also useful when drivers who reserve a space in advance are to be offered a lower rate. It is of particular interest at airports, among other locations, where travellers park for several days.

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Peter Park takes further work off its partners' hands with comprehensive service from a single source. Where parking violations occur, keeper data can be established through a request to the Kraftfahrt-Bundesamt (the German Federal Motor Transport Authority) and non-payers receive a contractual penalty.

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Digital parking at the Olympic ski jump in Innsbruck

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In everyday use, the Peter Park System has already proved itself on many sites, among them in Innsbruck: in autumn 2023, Bergisel Betriebsgesellschaft introduced the barrier-free parking management system from Peter Park at the car park by the Olympic ski jump. There, the digital solution provides a modern, user-friendly parking experience and reduces both effort and costs for Bergisel Betriebsgesellschaft. Low purchase, servicing and maintenance costs together with automated processes increase efficiency and profitability. 

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Bernhard Niggler, Managing Director of Bergisel Betriebsgesellschaft, names another key reason for the switch: „Many of our guests are tourists who plan their visit to the Bergisel as part of their holiday. When the barrier system failed, they previously had to wait for the security service to come and open the barrier so that they could continue their trip and drive on to the next sight, for example. With the barrier-free digital solution, drivers can set off at any time. That is one of the reasons we decided to introduce this innovative new solution at the Bergisel.“ 

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In the town of Wertheim in Baden-Württemberg and at Landesklinikum Scheibbs in Austria, too, outdated and maintenance-intensive barrier systems have had their day and have been successfully replaced by the Peter Park System.

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Happily barrier-free 

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Barrier systems served parking management well for many years. Digitalisation, however, is opening up new possibilities for parking administration as well. Smart parking management solutions such as the Peter Park System not only do away with costly mechanical components, they also supply operators with valuable data – the much-cited “gold of the 21st century”. Arrange a conversation with our digital parking experts now and go happily barrier-free.

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