Parking – people plus technology: by Phillip Herring, Commercial Director, VINCI Park.
Effective parking security is becoming increasingly important for shopping centres. Landlords’ and operators’ key concern is footfall, and economic pressures are creating choosier shoppers and challenging traditional catchment areas. For most shopping centres, the car park is the customer’s first point of call – initial impressions can, therefore, be integral to the overall shopping experience. With recent Government warnings of a recession-induced crime wave, safety is as important as ever.
For many customers, the total cost of their shopping basket has become a key consideration. The rising cost of petrol means this now has to be factored into the equation, making shoppers think twice about how far they are willing to drive to shop and the quality of their experience on arrival – especially at a centre they haven’t tried before.
Visitors want their whole stay to be comfortable – safe, stress-free and friendly. Cleanliness, good lighting and signage, clear bay and route markings, and effective surveillance are now ‘givens’, in terms of standards that must be met.
These factors are, of course, among the basic criteria for the Park Mark Scheme, run by the British Parking Association for the Association of Chief Police Officers, which VINCI Park supports. Park Mark status is now enjoyed by increasing numbers of UK shopping centres – even in smaller towns.
As it spreads, we know of centre managers who see scope for hotel-style grading of car parks, and the inclusion of new criteria as technology advances and new security enhancements become available. They could include greater use of automatic numberplate recognition (ANPR). We have no doubt that, well advertised, these would be additional deterrents to car crime and could lead to improved standards driven by healthy competition.
Home Office statistics show that sites meeting Park Mark criteria can already demonstrate a drop in vehicle-related crime of 80% or more. Importantly, scheme membership requires regular renewal – to ensure that standards do not slip.
Most customers, however, don’t have a clue about what Park Mark is, or the security benefits that parking in an accredited facility can bring. Shopping centres themselves could do more to promote it, and I think we need a national-scale effort to find ways of highlighting it to increase customer awareness of security issues overall, as well as of their ability to choose. The scheme has gone some way towards this with the launch of a new website, but it still needs more publicity to the end user.
The importance of visibility
Perhaps the most important contributor to effective security, however, is a human presence. There is an ongoing debate within the parking industry on how far on-site personnel can or should be replaced by technology – eg by relocating CCTV monitoring to remote control centres covering numbers of centres.
Innovative use of technology is obviously vital, to gain operational efficiencies and reduce costs. But, as car park operators and managers, we do not believe that it should ever become a 100% replacement for on-site personnel during normal opening hours. Centre managers tell us that their customers are reassured by a physical presence. (Indeed, research shows that the perceived threat of crime may be greater than the reality).
Where technology can play a vital role, however, is in releasing attendants from sitting all day in a site office, thus enabling them to move around the car park and undertake other functions. This contributes to creating a vital cared-for environment and makes them more visible to customers and possible criminals.
This dual approach enables technology and people to work together more productively and cost-effectively, to the mutual advantage of shopping centres and their customers. Proactive use of eyes and ears complementing responsive technology is, in our view, the optimum solution.
