The City of Middelburg Introduces the Parking Monitor by Monit Data

The municipality of Middelburg introduces digital monitoring of parking occupancy with the Parking Monitor from Monit Data. With this information about the actual use of parking capacity, the city’s parking policies can be reviewed and adjusted where necessary.

Better insights into a very diverse use of parking capacity

The municipality of Middelburg has a great diversity in the use of its parking facilities. As the capital of the Dutch province of Zeeland and home to 50,000 people there are of course residents, local businesses and visitors who park in the city. In addition, Middelburg also has many tourists attracted by the historic city center and the popular beaches of Zeeland. This great diversity in parking adds an extra challenge to the city’s traffic and parking policies.

The pressure on parking capacity is most noticeable in the city center. To address this Middelburg seeks to achieve a balance between multiple objectives in the city’s parking policies. In order to continue to attract visitors it is important to keep the city center attractive. Therefore good accessibility is an important factor. Parallel there is the goal to create a sustainable and pleasant living environment, with one approach being to make the city center car-free.

To meet these challenges, a focal point of Middelburg’s parking policies is to match the availability and demand for parking capacity. In particular the city has set out to use the existing capacity more effectively. To achieve this economic and social trends are taken into account, combined with recorded observations of the actual use of parking capacity.

“At a time when the balance between quality of life and accessibility is essential, Middelburg is taking a step forward with the Parking Monitor from Monit Data. This instrument enables us to refine our parking policy with a data-driven approach, taking into account the unique mix of residents, business, visitors and tourists that our city has. By gaining insight into the actual use of our parking facilities, we can create a city that remains hospitable, accessible and livable for everyone, not only today, but also in the future.” Manu Salhuteru, Coordinator Parking and Management Public Space.

In managing the city’s parking policies, Middelburg recognised the requirement for monitoring of several parking metrics. This for parking revenues, and in particular for the parking occupancy. With monitoring, information about the actual use of parking capacity for both on- and off-street can be provided. Given the diversity of parking use in the municipality, it also provides information about the different users such as residents, visitors, companies and tourists. Having this data-driven information available makes it possible to more easily review parking policies and adjust these where necessary.

Monitoring with the Parking Monitor from Monit Data.

To get the information about the actual use of parking capacity, the municipality of Middelburg has opted for digital monitoring with the Parking Monitor from Monit Data.

“Many cities face the challenge of effectively combining a ‘green’ living environment and accessibility. For Middelburg there is an additional complexity with the important tourist visitors. With Monit Data’s Parking Monitor we can help the municipality with an effective data-driven parking policy that takes this diversity into account.” Ernst Bos, Managing Director Monit Data. 

The Parking Monitor is a cloud-based software solution that provides parking operators with insights for policies, and financial and operational management. With the Parking Monitor data from various parking systems and data sources is collected and transformed into a uniform database. This process allows raw data to be enriched into clear information, and various data can be combined to create surprising new insights. An example of the latter is the use of data available from the scan car. The scan car is already being used for parking enforcement in many cities. By connecting data sources and using algorithms we can now also use the scan car for reliable and cost-effective parking occupancy reports.

With Monit Data’s Parking Monitor, public and private operators no longer have to deal with time-consuming and repetitive data collection. Instead they can shift their focus to using data for policy and management decisions with our clear and automatically generated insights. The recently introduced Parking Data 2.0 makes this even easier with further improved dashboards and more extensive analysis options.

Earlier this year the Municipality of Middelburg and Monit Data started implementing the Parking Monitor. The first step was adding on-street parking data into the platform. This immediately resulted in many valuable insights about payments, both from mobile applications and at parking meters. As the next step in the rollout, data from off-street parking will be connected to the Parking Monitor.

Middelburg is also considering using the scan car for parking enforcement. The parking occupancy reports with the scan car, a new module in the Parking Monitor now introduced in many cities, will also be added at that time.

About Monit Data

Monit Data provides parking data analytics services for municipalities and private operators. User-friendly dashboards give clear information on car, EV, and bicycle usage. Use data-driven insights for urban mobility policies and day-to-day operational management.

About Middelburg

Middelburg is the capital of the Dutch province of Zeeland and is home to 50.000 people. The city strives to be an attractive city for all residents, companies and visitors. This by creating an environment for living, working and learning in an atmosphere that matches its history, and with dynamics for the future.

www.middelburg.nl