Click on the link to see the full article: Looking at parking policy for company parking lots
Your company’s parking lot is a resource not to be neglected. It contributes to the smooth running of your establishment and allows you to manage the mobility of your employees, but it can also cause employee dissatisfaction. It is therefore important that the regulations within it be well thought out so that all staff members are satisfied. The parking policy is the means by which you will make this possible.
The current context
The decrease in the number of parking spaces in company parking lots
In Belgium, as in some places in France, the authorities, with a view to encouraging a modal shift from cars to more sustainable modes of travel, have adopted initiatives to reduce the number of parking spaces in office buildings. In the long term, the hope is to create a pleasant urban space that gives way to green spaces and non-polluting public transit or transportation infrastructure.
One example is the COBRACE (Brussels Code for Air, Climate and Energy Management) in Brussels. This regulation defines the number of parking spaces authorized for each company based on its office space and its accessibility via public transportation.
The car, the preferred means of transportation for commuters
Despite the many initiatives put in place to encourage the use of more sustainable means of transportation, the car remains the mode of transportation used by 70% and 65% of the French and Belgian workforce respectively for commuting to and from work.
Here is a report on the use of the car to get to work:
- When a parking space is guaranteed in the workplace, 72% of workers will drive to it
- When there is no guaranteed parking space at the workplace, 50% of the staff drive to work
We note that 22% of workers will change their mode of travel depending on the presence or absence of a company parking lot. For this reason, it is important to adapt the parking lot to the needs of the users and to allow them to plan their journeys as much as possible. This will encourage modal shift of the car while keeping employees satisfied.
The parking policy in a few words
The parking policy is a regulation applied within a company in order to regulate parking within its parking lot. It aims at optimizing the management of the latter by implementing several solutions and functionalities in response to the complexity of the problem encountered. Generally speaking, this management policy allows for the fluidity of vehicle traffic both upstream and inside the parking lot. This policy is therefore carried out within the framework of global mobility management. The parking policy is also more generally part of the mobility plan and makes it effective.
As the problems encountered by companies are specific to each one, it is important that the parking policy is created specifically for each establishment and that it be adapted to its needs, those of its employees, and the company culture.
Simply put, by implementing a parking policy, you decide the type of access to the parking lot that each employee or visitor will be entitled to. An employee will be able to have preferential access, i.e. he or she will be given a guaranteed place in the parking lot. For other companies, each employee may have a quota of parking space, but all employees must make a reservation in advance. Others may have a quota of parking days within the parking lot and reserve their space in advance.
A parking policy will need to be carefully thought out and take into account several criteria such as:
- The total number of workers (and visitors)
- Number of workers driving to work
- The attendance rate
- The occupancy rate of the parking lot
It will also be important to take into account the different types of jobs of your employees as well as their personal mobility needs.
Discover here how to create the right parking policy for your business.
The parking policy, a real asset for your company
Everything is going well in your company and you don’t see how a parking policy could improve your company’s operations? We’ll go over its benefits with you.
The benefits of a parking policy are multiple. Everyone will benefit from the implementation of such a regulation, the employees, the company itself, but also the community.
A helping hand to reduce the modal share of the car
If your company has a modal shift target included in its mobility plan, parking policy is one of the most effective measures to achieve a modal shift to more sustainable means of transportation than the car. If your parking policy aims to reduce the number of people driving to work, you will encourage people to use other means of transportation.
Some of the workers may live only a few kilometers from your office, but still use the car to get there. Note that 50% of trips in the city are less than 3 kilometers. You could therefore have an impact on the movement of these people. By adopting active modes of transportation such as biking or walking for short distances in the city, these employees will no longer encounter parking problems and will also be able to move faster and without irritation in traffic jams. In the city, the average speed of a cyclist is 15 km/h while the average speed of a car is 14 km/h.
A more pleasant daily life for employees
Some workers find that unregulated parking in your company parking lot is not fair. Sometimes they have no choice but to drive to work, and never find a free parking space, while others might use another means of transportation and thus free up space.
The parking policy will help bring about fairer regulation within the company. By developing a parking policy, you can take into account everyone’s specific mobility criteria so that everyone is treated fairly. Employees will feel more listened to and gain confidence.
Once parking is optimized, the frustrations of employees who did not previously have assigned parking spaces will be reduced. They will also be able to let go of the stress and uncertainty of finding a parking space. This reduction in stress will also be felt in the human resources department, which will no longer receive all complaints about parking in the company parking lot. People from the department will also benefit from a time saving that will allow them to concentrate on other equally important daily tasks.
Discover here the other advantages of adopting a parking policy in your company parking.
The current context, which involves, for example, the increase in teleworking and the implementation of the flex office, only reinforces the need for a parking policy. Establishing such regulation will, in the long term, save time for you and your employees. The latter will be able to adapt their mobility according to the access they will have inside the parking lot.
Originally published at https://blog.bepark.eu.
