Accessibility
Parking in urban areas
Off-street parking facilities have a positive impact on the quality of life in urban areas and in large cities in particular. After all, a city is more attractive if it is easily accessible while having fewer cars parked on streets and in town squares. With our parking facilities and services, we contribute to the accessibility of vital functions.
We work together with municipalities to tune fair parking tariffs for different facilities and distances, such as parking on-street or in parking facilities, and in the city centre or at the outskirts.
By engaging municipalities in dialogue on these matters, we want to share our expertise and make a contribution to the accessibility and sustainability of cities. We actively seek collaboration with local governments so that regulated and paid parking become an integral part of urban mobility.
Figure 16 Access with P+R and P+W solutions
Even though municipalities throughout Europe are increasingly imposing restrictions on city centre access by cars, some access is required to be inclusive to all sections of society.
Some visitors prefer to travel as close as possible to their final destination by car and are willing to pay for that service, others opt for a journey including Park+Ride or Park+Walk.
Inner-ring purpose-built parking facilities particularly enhance accessibility while maintaining mobility and access for all. They reduce inner-city search traffic and on-street parking which, in turn, improves the liveability for residents and visitors alike.
With purpose-built parking facilities at varying distances from the city centre and with varying parking tariff schemes, Q-Park contributes to:
accessibility to amenities such as public transport, hospitals, shops and events;
decreasing traffic searching for a place to park;
freeing up public space for urban parks and town squares;
creating opportunities to reduce on-street parking;
nudging motorists to make informed choices;
creating sustainable parking solutions;
decreasing subsidised parking, by pursuing the 'user pays' principle.
Figure 17 Q-Park market position in Western Europe
Results
We operate in seven Western European countries: Netherlands, Germany, France, Belgium, UK, Ireland and Denmark.
We have a top three market leader position in six of these countries: Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, France, Ireland and Denmark.
We are present in more than 400 cities.
We manage a total of:
3,308 parking facilities;
649,189 parking spaces.
Our off-street portfolio consists of:
761 parking facilities;
288,820 parking spaces.
Parking near hospitals
At Q-Park, we partner with hospitals and healthcare facilities whenever we can. This allows the hospital to focus on its core business of healthcare while we focus on the parking.
When we partner with a hospital, we first diagnose parking needs. We help the hospital gain insight into the types of treatments they provide, the preferred means of transport and parking movements per target group (staff, patients and visitors) to determine:
the parking capacity required;
a bespoke tariff structure;
specific parking products;
a nudging mobility menu per target group.
This helps a hospital understand the needs of their parking customers. When Q-Park operates a hospital car park, we will ensure our signature features are present. For hospitals these include:
extra spaces for blue badge holders;
wide parking bays, preferably angled for easy access;
specially trained Parking Hosts, committed to providing friendly and respectful service in line with that of the hospital’s own policy and procedures;
separate parking areas for staff and visitors.