Skip to main content

Westminster City Council to crack down on illegal parking in disabled bays

Westminster City Council, in partnership with Smart Parking, is set to unveil new technology which could eliminate the issue of inconsiderate drivers parking in disabled bays. New technology emerging out of Westminster’s successful bay sensors pilot in central London now means that disabled drivers can be issued with electronic permits, known as EPermits or RFID tags, which communicate with sensors in the road. Should a car without a tag park in a disabled bay with a sensor illegally, nearby traffic marshal
December 2, 2015 Read time: 2 mins

Westminster City Council, in partnership with 8034 Smart Parking, is set to unveil new technology which could eliminate the issue of inconsiderate drivers parking in disabled bays.

New technology emerging out of Westminster’s successful bay sensors pilot in central London now means that disabled drivers can be issued with electronic permits, known as EPermits or RFID tags, which communicate with sensors in the road.

Should a car without a tag park in a disabled bay with a sensor illegally, nearby traffic marshals will be alerted so that they could go to the site and ask the driver to move on. They also have the power to issue a fine as a last resort.

Councillor Heather Acton, Westminster City Council cabinet member for parking, said: “Parking in a disabled bay must be one of the most inconsiderate things a driver can do – yet we still see it very regularly in Westminster. We hope this new technology will put an end to this poor practice and help improve the day to day lives of disabled drivers in the city.”
 
Paul Gillespie, Smart Parking’s Group Chief Executive Officer added: “We are delighted to be collaborating with Westminster City Council and 1466 Transport for London in the launch of the EPermit pilot – a world first. This new technology will help to eliminate misuse of disabled parking bays broadening Westminster City Council’s commitment to providing fairer, easier, parking”.
 
The pilot project is set to last around eight weeks, and evaluation will be carried out before a decision is made on a citywide roll out.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • ITS Europe experts share mobility lab lessons
    June 4, 2019
    “Real problems” need to emerge in the development of an urban mobility lab before you can begin to find solutions, according to Raimo Tengvall, project manager of Forum Virium Helsinki. Speaking at this week’s ITS European Congress in Eindhoven, Netherlands, Tengvall shared lessons learned from the company’s Jätkäsaari urban mobility lab in the Finnish capital, Helsinki. “In the Jätkäsaari area we were having 80 million passengers going through a street network of a new residential area where there is a
  • Venkat Sumantran: ‘Smart cities are more hype than reality’
    November 23, 2018
    For all the talk of smart cities, investment in systems lags significantly behind organic expansion in most places. Andrew Stone talks to Venkat Sumantran, who has been looking at how to create a coherent framework which could help authorities answer multiple mobility questions Two megatrends are posing unprecedented challenges to those trying to keep people moving around the world’s urban areas now - and in the years and decades to come. The first is rapid urbanisation. One in six of us lived in urban a
  • New York’s MTA tests new safety technology on buses
    October 5, 2015
    As part of the MTA’s ongoing commitment to improving safety across all agencies and in coordination with New York City’s Vision Zero plan, MTA New York City Transit has begun to test new technologies aimed at improving safety for drivers, bus customers and pedestrians. The 60-day tests of pedestrian turn warning and collision avoidance systems will determine if a full pilot of one or both systems can proceed in 2016. NYC Transit’s Department of Buses is testing two systems on six buses: a pedestrian turn
  • IBTTA 2010 meeting focuses on sustainability
    February 2, 2012
    Ken Philmus, chief meeting organiser, talks about what attendees can expect to see at this year's IBTTA annual meeting and exhibition