Parking policies in large cities in Germany

This article deals with highly motorized large West German cities of about 200,000 inhabitants and more, which usually provide reasonable public transport systems. Illegal parking with shares of about 40 to 50% of the total parking is widespread in the parking problem areas of those cities, especially in the inner-city residential and mixed-use areas. Parking spaces are demanded by residents, employees, customers and visitors, and by delivery and service traffic. The different characteristics of parking demands by different user groups are discussed. The total parking supply consists of public and private spaces. The share of private spaces is about 40 to 50% of the total parking spaces in German cities. The amount of car traffic generated by a parking space depends on parking duration and parking turnover, as well as on search traffic. So the change of a space from long-duration use of an employee to short-duration of customers — as often discussed in parking concepts — generates at least five-fold car traffic. The measurements and effects of parking control of public spaces as well as the parking regulations in zoning ordinances, restrictions on the construction of new private parking spaces and park-and-ride are discussed. Finally, a parking concept methodology — using the example of Frankfurt am Main — is discussed.     

Parking space management via dynamic performance-based pricing

In congested urban areas, it remains a pressing challenge to reduce unnecessary vehicle circling for parking while at the same time maximize parking space utilization. In observance of new information technologies that have become readily accessible to drivers and parking agencies, we develop a dynamic non-cooperative bi-level model (i.e. Stackelberg leader–follower game) to set parking prices in real-time for effective parking access and space utilization. The model is expected to fit into an integrated parking pricing and management system, where parking reservations and transactions are facilitated by sensing and informatics infrastructures, that ensures the availability of convenient spaces at equilibrium market prices. It is shown with numerical examples that the proposed dynamic parking pricing model has the potential to virtually eliminate vehicle circling for parking, which results in significant reduction in adverse socioeconomic externalities such as traffic congestion and emissions.     

Maximum car ownership under constraints of road capacity and parking space

This paper presents a model for determining the maximum number of cars by zones in view of the capacity of the road network and the number of parking spaces available. In other words, the proposed model is to examine whether existing road network and parking supply is capable of accommodating future zonal car ownership growth (or the reserve capacity in each zone); i.e. the potential maximum zonal car ownership growth that generates the road traffic within the network capacity and parking space constraints. In the proposed model, the vehicular trip production and attraction are dependent on the car ownership, available parking spaces and the accessibility measures by traffic zones. The model is formulated as a bi-level programming problem. The lower-level problem is an equilibrium trip distribution/assignment problem, while the upper-level problem is to maximize the sum of zonal car ownership by considering travellers’ route and destination choice behaviour and satisfying the network capacity and parking space constraints. A sensitivity analysis based heuristic algorithm is developed to solve the proposed bi-level car ownership problem and is illustrated with a numerical example.     

Evaluating parking reservation policy in urban areas: An environmental perspective

This paper investigates a parking reservation mechanism to reduce car cruising to find parking. To consider the benefits for drivers and parking facility providers, we charge drivers for making reservations in addition to parking fees, by introducing a reservation pricing model that makes reservation prices equivalent to the value of saved search time. By modeling the number of vacant spaces as a stochastic variable, and applying binomial pricing methods, parking reservation prices are obtained. Numerical examples based on the data for two parking facilities in Taiwan are given.     

A simple reservation and allocation model of shared parking lots

With increasing auto demands, efficient parking management is by no means less important than road traffic congestion control. This is due to shortages of parking spaces within the limited land areas of the city centers in many metropolises. The parking problem becomes an integrated part of traffic planning and management. On the other hand, it is a fact that many private parking spots are available during daytime in nearby residential compound because those residents drive their cars out to work. These temporarily vacant parking lots can be efficiently utilized to meet the parking demand of other drivers who are working at nearby locations or drivers who come for shopping or other activities. This paper proposes a framework and a simple model for embracing shared use of residential parking spaces between residents and public users. The proposed shared use is a winning strategy because it maximizes the use of private resources to benefit the community as a whole. It also creates a new business model enabled by the fast-growing mobile apps in our daily lives.     

Modeling the impact of parking price policy on free-floating carsharing: Case study for Zurich,Switzerland

The research on carsharing has already shown that a non-negligible part of carsharing members give up a vehicle after joining a carsharing program, or avoid a vehicle purchase. This arguably reduces overall parking space needed. This might well be one of the most important impacts of a carsharing program on the transportation system, but also one of the least researched. The rapid diffusion of free-floating carsharing, which for its very nature might have a stronger impact on parking, makes the relationship between carsharing and parking an appealing topic for new research. This work presents a method for the investigation of this relationship using an agent-based simulation and explores the impacts of different parking prices on the demand for free-floating carsharing in the city of Zurich, Switzerland. Three levels of free-floating fleet-size in the city of Zurich coupled with three levels of parking prices were simulated. The obtained results show that free-floating vehicles are able to use parking spaces more efficiently than private vehicles. Moreover, the average parking occupancy tends to be more homogeneous with higher fleet-size of free-floating carsharing and with the increase of parking prices, thus avoiding spatial parking pressure peaks.     

Economical welfare maximisation analysis: assessing the use of existing Park-and-Ride services

This paper assesses travellers’ responses to the use of existing Park-and-Ride (P&R) services based on an economical welfare maximisation approach. Specifically, the paper presents a modelling framework to estimate consumer surplus and producer surplus (business profits) on the basis of modal choice probabilities. The paper draws on evidence from Stated Preference surveys conducted around two P&R sites in Sapporo, Japan, where P&R services occupy a modest market space. Overall, the results suggest that business profit increases when economical welfare is maximised, as a consequence of increased demand. It is also shown that P&R choice is not only influenced by parking fees, but also by the fares and other attributes of alternative transportation modes. Accordingly, the interactions of P&R with alternative transportation modes should be taken into consideration in any strategic transportation policies oriented towards motivating sustainable transport mode choices.     

Impact of government incentives on the market penetration of electric vehicles in Australia

Incentives to buy and use electric vehicles (EVs) may influence individuals’ decisions to do so. To examine these impacts, a latent class discrete choice model is developed to analyse consumer preferences related to EV attributes and related government incentives. Data was collected from a stated preference survey of 1,076 residents of New South Wales (NSW), Australia. According to the results, the proposed latent constructs classify respondents into five segments. The segments are then used to distinguish respondent behaviours regarding EV attributes and related government incentives. The results show that rebate on the upfront cost of an EV is the most preferred one-off financial incentive, because EVs are expected to be expensive, especially in Australia which has a very small EV market at present. Furthermore, rebates on energy bills and parking fees are also well-received, as these things are expensive in Sydney, Australia. Thus, operational incentives for discounts on energy bills and parking fees may facilitate the success of EVs in NSW.     

A study on smart parking guidance algorithm

Parking problem becomes one of major issues in the city transportation management since the spatial resource of a city is limited and the parking cost is expensive. Lots of cars on the road should spend unnecessary time and consume energy during searching for parking due to limited parking space. To cope with these limitations and give more intelligent solutions to drivers in the selection of parking facility, this study proposes a smart parking guidance algorithm. The proposed algorithm supports drivers to find the most appropriate parking facility considering real-time status of parking facilities in a city. To suggest the most suitable parking facility, several factors such as driving distance to the guided parking facility, walking distance from the guided parking facility to destination, expected parking cost, and traffic congestion due to parking guidance, are considered in the proposed algorithm. To evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm, simulation tests have been carried out. The proposed algorithm helps to maximize the utilization of space resources of a city, and reduce unnecessary energy consumption and CO₂ emission of wandering cars since it is designed to control the utilization of parking facility efficiently and reduce traffic congestion due to parking space search.     

The economics of parking provision for the morning commute

In this paper, we study the economics of parking provision for the morning commute, where all the parking lots are owned and operated by private operators. The parking capacity allocations, parking fees and access times are considered in a parking market. First we solve the parking market equilibrium without regulatory intervention, revealing four types of competitive equilibrium. Only one of the four types of equilibrium, however, is found to be stable and realistic, and under it each parking area is preferred by the commuters during certain time periods. Compared to the case without parking choice, provision of parking through a competitive market is able to reduce commuters’ travel cost and queuing delay, but it does not necessarily lead to the most desirable market outcome that minimizes social cost or commuter cost. This issue can be addressed through market regulations, such as price-ceiling, capacity-floor or capacity-ceiling, and a quantity tax/subsidy regulation. It is found that both price-ceiling and quantity tax/subsidy regulations can efficiently reduce both the system cost and commuter cost under certain conditions, and help ensure the stability of the parking market. Numerical examples are also provided to illustrate these findings and furthermore, how a price ceiling or a quantity tax/subsidy should be set in a parking market under realistic model parameters.     

Serial private infrastructures

This paper investigates private supply of two congestible infrastructures that are serial, where the consumer has to use both in order to consume. Four market structures are analysed: a monopoly and 3 duopolies that differ in how firms interact. It is well known that private supply leads too high usage fees, and that a serial duopoly leads to even higher fees than a monopoly, as firms are monopolists on their sections. But, as this paper finds, a duopoly can also lead to a different capacity rule than the first-best one, and this distortion differs from with two parallel facilities. Finally, four auction formats for the right to build and operate facilities are investigated. With a bid auction, the competition is on how much to pay the government. This auction leads to the same outcome as no auction. An auction on the facility’s capacity leads to an even lower welfare than no auction, as firms set overly large high capacities. Conversely, an auction on the generalised price or number of users leads to the first-best outcome, which they do when the facilities go to one or two winners and both with serial as with parallel facilities.     

Parking management for promoting sustainable transport in urban neighbourhoods. A review of existing policies and challenges from a German perspective

ABSTRACT

The organisation of parking is a key challenge to more sustainable mobility in urban areas, as its pricing and availability affect the rates of private car ownership and use. However, changing parking policies is a challenging issue for local politicians and planners because residents frequently oppose changes or restrictions to conditions they have taken for granted such as on-street parking in a public space. The aim of this paper is firstly to assess how the parking policy of an urban neighbourhood can be structured to contribute to more sustainable mobility and to increase liveability in the neighbourhood. The second aim is to apply the policies reviewed to an example neighbourhood. For this purpose, we systematically reviewed academic literature and identified five types of relevant parking policies: (i) maximum parking requirements, (ii) physical detachment of residence and parking space, (iii) residential parking permits and the limitation of available parking space, (iv) performance-based pricing and (v) parking as a demand management strategy. We discovered that most research focuses on econometric models about parking and that studies rarely address the effects of parking on the quality of life in neighbourhoods. Therefore, we need further research regarding the relationship of parking and liveability. We conclude that for the implementation of such parking policies in an example neighbourhood, the municipality needs to develop a mobility vision for its city. It has to understand parking as a tool for transportation demand management to increase the acceptance of parking policy concepts and to avoid spillover problems. Finally, in the German case, as in most other countries, states and municipalities need to redesign their legal frameworks to be able to manage parking supply better and to react to changes related to digital developments and parking. The findings have implications for other European neighbourhoods regarding the transfer from research to local circumstances and applications for the whole city.     

Nonlinear pricing on private roads with congestion and toll collection costs

Nonlinear pricing (a form of second-degree price discrimination) is widely used in transportation and other industries but it has been largely overlooked in the road-pricing literature. This paper explores the incentives for a profit-maximizing toll-road operator to adopt some simple nonlinear pricing schemes when there is congestion and collecting tolls is costly. Users are assumed to differ in their demands to use the road. Regardless of the severity of congestion, an access fee is always profitable to implement either as part of a two-part tariff or as an alternative to paying a toll. Use of access fees for profit maximization can increase or decrease welfare relative to usage-only pricing for profit maximization. Hence a ban on access fees could reduce welfare.     

Distance-dependent congestion pricing for downtown zones

A growing literature exploits macroscopic theories of traffic to model congestion pricing policies in downtown zones. This study introduces trip length heterogeneity into this analysis and proposes a usage-based, time-varying congestion toll that alleviates congestion while prioritizing shorter trips. Unlike conventional trip-based tolls the scheme is intended to align the fees paid by drivers with the actual congestion damage they do, and to increase the toll’s benefits as a result.The scheme is intended to maximize the number of people that finish their trips close to their desired times. The usage-based toll is compared to a traditional, trip-based toll which neglects trip length. It is found that, like trip-based tolls, properly designed usage-based tolls alleviate congestion. But they reduce schedule delay more than trip-based tolls and do so with much smaller user fees. As a result usage-based tolls leave most of those who pay with a large welfare gain. This may increase the tolls’ political acceptability.     

Addressing electric vehicle (EV) sales and range anxiety through parking layout,policy and regulation

Electric Vehicles (EV) are highly beneficial due to their reliance on electricity and Climate Change response yet EV sales are lower than would be expected due to range anxiety. If a potential buyer cannot be assured of having constantly-available and compatible charging stations, they will not purchase an EV. To increase the sales of EVs through improved charger availability, this paper examines parking configurations, charger design, convenient “EV only” parking, free charging, etiquette in unplugging another’s vehicle, and legislation. Data were derived from academic publications, trade market press, conversations, personal observations, and laws. The results show that chargers are often in a lot’s corner and thus accessible only to one vehicle, EV owners leave their charged car in the space, drivers use EV spaces for parking, etiquette cards are not understood, and legislation makes it illegal to unplug another’s EV. Improvements include less convenient charger spots, an octopus charger in the middle of the parking lot, modest charging fees to foster turnover, chargers that indicate an EV is charged, education and legislation about etiquette cards, and legislation that allows an individual to unplug another’s charged EV. Improvements to charging should be implemented simultaneously to lessen range anxiety and realize the environmental benefits from reductions in gasoline consumption and mobile source air pollution.     

E-commerce and traffic congestion: An economic and policy analysis

E-commerce, due to its ability to re-direct consumers from physical stores to online, can potentially alleviate traffic congestion. In this paper, we set up a theoretic model to analyze interactions between a firm’s distribution strategy and traffic congestion. In an unregulated economy, we first characterize the private firm’s optimal strategy concerning e-commerce under the influence of traffic congestion. We then examine a centralized economy where the firm is publicly owned and derive the distribution strategy that maximizes social welfare. Comparing the two cases, we show that the private firm’s incentives may deviate from the socially optimal decisions, which leads to inefficiency. We identify two effects, i.e., monopoly effect and congestion externality effect, which drive the private firm to deviate from the social optimum. Based on our analysis, we propose a differentiated tolls/rebates policy to achieve maximum social welfare. Under such a policy, the firm will not only adopt the socially optimal distribution strategy but offer the socially optimal quantities.     

Expirable parking reservations for managing morning commute with parking space constraints

When total parking supply in an urban downtown area is insufficient, morning commuters would choose their departure times not only to trade off bottleneck congestion and schedule delays, but also to secure a parking space. Recent studies found that an appropriate combination of reserved and unreserved parking spaces can spread the departures of those morning commuters and hence reduce their total travel cost. To further mitigate both traffic congestion and social cost from competition for parking, this study considers a parking reservation scheme with expiration times, where commuters with a parking reservation have to arrive at parking spaces for the reservation before a predetermined expiration time. We first show that if all parking reservations have the same expiration time, it is socially preferable to set the reservations to be non-expirable, i.e., without expiration time. However, if differentiated expiration times are properly designed, the total travel cost can be further reduced as compared with the reservation scheme without expiration time, since the peak will be further smoothed out. We explore socially desirable equilibrium flow patterns under the parking reservation scheme with differentiated expiration times. Finally, efficiencies of the reservation schemes are examined.     

Adaptive choice behaviour of motorists in congested shopping centre parking lots

Currently existing models of parking choice behaviour typically focus on the choice of types of parking spaces. Implicitly these models assume that motorists have a free choice in that spaces are available. The adaptive behaviour which they reveal when faced with congested parking spaces is not explicitly modelled. The aim of this paper is to contribute to the growing literature on parking choice modelling by developing and testing a stated choice model of adaptive behaviour of motorists who are faced with fully occupied parking lots. The findings of the analyses indicate that the model performs satisfactory as indicated by its goodness-of-fit and the fact that all significant parameters were in anticipated directions.     

Flexible parking requirements for office developments: New support for public parking and ridesharing

The author examines new, flexible parking requirements in several U.S. cities and Canada. Flexible requirements provide relaxations in zoning code specifications for off-street parking in return for developer commitments to ridesharing measures, support of transit or in-lieu fees for public parking. Issues examined include whether developers take advantage of flexible requirements, whether agreements with developers lead to agreed-upon action, and whether actions lead to desired results. Based on experiences of several cities, implications and cautions are drawn for local planners. The first caution relates to cities using flexible requirements to collect in-lieu fees in support of public parking. Where cities delay providing parking, inflation may make it difficult to provide the desired parking supply. Or, developers may not choose to pay the fee, such as in the case where cities grant relaxations for other measures more attractive than paying the fees.Other implications relate to flexible requirements in support of ridesharing or transit. Developers will not necessarily take advantage of relaxations tied to support of these modes. Generally, developers will take the least-cost ways to gain relaxations. They may choose to provide the parking where transit or ridesharing measures are too costly or complex. Or, they may take relaxations easier to obtain than those for ridesharing and transit. Finally, even where developers do agree to ridesharing measures, the measures may not be effective. On the other hand, developer-sponsored actions have proven effective in some cities where tight or expensive parking prevails, or where neighborhood residents have organized against office commuters parking on neighborhood streets, or where other economic or community variables favor ridesharing and transit.     

Social welfare analysis of investment public–private partnership approaches for transportation projects

This paper has two objectives: (i) to introduce a new approach in order to gain widespread support for road pricing; and (ii) to develop a detailed social welfare analysis for road pricing schemes. We first describe our novel approach that stimulates public support for road pricing, which we refer to as an investment public–private partnership, or IP3. This approach returns a significant portion of the economic value created by road pricing back to the citizens who own the newly priced facility. We then present a social welfare framework that estimates the benefits and costs of using the IP3 approach on an urban transportation network. A P3 project’s impact on overall social welfare provides a more comprehensive evaluation criterion than the often-used Value for Money (VfM) analysis. Apart from several theoretical studies, a detailed social welfare analysis that includes all major P3 project stakeholders is absent from the literature. We use Fresno, California as our case study in order to conduct a welfare analysis on IP3s. Our results show that system-optimal tolling favors average users, but that government—and consequently taxpayers—should pay for costly tolling systems (negative profits). In contrast, unlimited profit-maximizing tolls raise substantial profits for government, for the infrastructure’s citizen-owners, and for the private sector, but the average user is worse off. From a social-welfare perspective, one should search for a Pareto improvement under which all major stakeholders are better off. Our estimates indicate that a mixed public and private tolling scheme offers such an improvement.