Scheidt & Bachmann and Urbis Park put the NFC project into operation

The NFC project at the “Parking République“ car park in Metz, France was put into operation with a much publicised opening ceremony on the 4th of December. Together with Urbis Park, Scheidt & Bachmann has implemented a solution, which allows drivers to drive in and out of the car park and pay without cash, using NFC technology. Thus parking tickets and paying by cash are things of the past.

Since 2010, people have already been able to pay on-street parking by mobile phone in Metz. Now Urbis Park has also set its sights on car parks: Here, in the biggest car park in town, which is equipped with a car park management system from Scheidt & Bachmann, and has 2,100 parking spaces and 1.1 million parkers annually, drivers can now pay their parking fee by means of contactless NFC technology. Drivers identify themselves at the entry and exit with a NFC equipped phone or a smart tag, which is attached to the phone. In advance customers register with the online service and receive their personalised ID. Via online authorisation, the parking fee is automatically determined on exit and debited to the customer´s prepaid account.

Patrick Moretton, Managing Director of Scheidt & Bachmann France, is happy about the success of this project and points to the special comfort for customers. “After all, parking doesn't only take place in car parks. The clever thing about Metz is the one-time registration of customers applies both to on-street parking as well as off-street in the “Parking République“ car park. Customers who have already registered for on-street parking can simply extend their account to include off-street parking.“

“Whether you park on-street or off-street in the “Parking République“ car park - the mobile phone becomes an innovative tool and, thanks to this technology, parking takes on a new comfortable ease,“ also comments Bruno Martin, Regional Director of Urbis Park in Metz.

The city of Metz has watched all the activities surrounding contactless payment with great interest. “Metz has decided to use the technology and so offer its citizens and guests a high degree of comfort when parking. Since paying with a mobile phone for on-street parking has been possible for more than 2 years, contactless payment in car parks is the logical next step in innovation – also to meet the drivers' needs,“ sums up Dominique Gros, Mayor of Metz.

NFC stands for Near Field Communication and is an international transmission standard for contactless exchange of information between devices up to a distance of approx. 10 cm.

Urbis Park is one of the leading parking operators in Europe, and manages over 58.000 parking spaces. As a long-standing partner of local authorities, it manages public parking spaces in the most important regions of France, such as Paris, Bordeaux, Marseille, Metz, Laval, Nancy, Reims. Urbis Park has been working with Mobile City, the market leader in mobile data gathering and mobile phone parking, since 2010.