Portsmouth Historic Dockyard Chooses WPS' Pay-on-Foot Technology to Support Visitor Experience and Enhance Charity’s Revenues

A sophisticated pay-on-foot ticketed parking system from WPS, one of the UK’s leading parking equipment providers, is being installed at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard to deliver seamless access for visitors, local hotel guests, and residents of the development above the car park, with revenue generated going to support investment in the curation of 500 years of naval history.

Attracting 750,000 visitors every year, the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard is the leading maritime heritage attraction in the UK and forms part of the Royal Navy Base. The site houses a cross-section of British Naval history, from the Mary Rose and HMS Victory to modern-day aircraft carriers. It is also home to the National Museum of the Royal Navy, the ever-popular Harbour Tour boats, and numerous restaurants and cafes.

Adjacent to a ferry, train, coach, and bus station, the attraction is well set up for visitors to arrive by public transport, but Patrick Holmes, Deputy Chief Executive of the Portsmouth Naval Base Property Trust, says with 90,000 cars arriving each year, it is important to provide a well-presented, modern and reliable parking facility:

“For those traveling by car, the visitor experience starts and ends at the car park, so it has to make the right impression. We chose the WPS pay-on-foot system because we had already been convinced it is an efficient alternative to pay & display, requiring less staff and not having to rely on enforcement – which is vital for the customer experience. It is also completely self-service, supporting COVID safety.”

Two of WPS’ ParkAdvance™ pay stations, one that is cashless, will support chip & pin, contactless, Apple and Google Pay functionality, and feature an intuitive 12-inch, fully-customizable color screen, and IP intercom. Chip & pin and contactless payment functionality will also be installed at exit barriers to support a smooth exit for customers who forget to pay.

Supporting the business in providing its visitors with a COVID-safe experience, the system includes touchless entry sensors and ticket scanners.

High-performing automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras will be installed at the entry and exit barriers, enabling the use of parking payment apps. The app provides pre-payment, season ticket, and truly free-flow access options with subscribers entering and exiting automatically when the ANPR system recognizes registered car number plates. RFID proximity readers will provide straightforward access to residents.

The system is compatible with Portsmouth City Council’s VMS communication system to enable the communication of a number of spaces available on key routes in the City Centre.

With a sophisticated IP-based operating architecture the WPS ParkAdvance™ system provides a flexible, future-proofed, and intelligent solution, and Patrick says this was an important aspect of the purchase decision:

“Setting up different access for various users, local hotel guests and residents, for example, is very straightforward,” he says. “And future-proofing our investment, we can add functionality as and when required – for example, when feasible, we may introduce loyalty promotions such as discounted parking for customers that eat in restaurants in the Dockyard.”

Simon Jarvis, Managing Director of WPS in the UK, says as we come out of lockdown, it is more important than ever that parking facilities deliver the right customer experience and support businesses’ revenues:

“The leisure industry depends on the customer journey, and when attracting visitors back it will be important to provide a simple, COVID-safe experience. And for businesses having to look more closely at the bottom line it will also be essential that the revenues generated by parking facilities are optimized"

“Portsmouth Historic Dockyard is a fantastic addition to WPS’ leisure industry portfolio.”

“WPS took the time to fully understand our venue and its requirements and the result is a convenient system ideally suited to our needs,” concludes Patrick. “And with the revenue our car park generates supporting us as a charity and enabling us to reinvest profits into preserving history and providing a fun and educational public attraction – it was essential we got it right.”

The car park at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard has 295 spaces, 13 of which are disabled and four are electric.

About WPS

WPS focus on practical innovation and bring together technology to provide our customers with smart but primarily reliable and future proof Parking Solutions, ready to face the connected world of today and tomorrow.WPS want to be recognized as a leading provider of reliable parking management solutions with focus on “practical innovation” and become a top-3 player in all the markets we operate in.