The case of Controlled Parking Management in Thessaloniki & its optimization by the CUTLER project
About this good practice
Thessaloniki is a densely inhabited city with a high demand for parking spaces. In 2017 a new Controlled Parking System (CPS) was installed in the city center known as THESi. THESi aims to regulate the available on-street parking places, preventing illegal parking and relieving traffic congestion to reduce CO2 emissions. The available parking spaces are divided into white and blue sectors destined for visitors and permanent residents respectively. Free parking is provided for e-vehicles owners and disabled fellow citizens.
CPS is supported by a tool, developed in the CUTLER project, the Municipality of Thessaloniki (Mot) being a partner. Its aim is to develop a platform enabling policy design, implementation and evaluation, focusing on urban resilience in order to shift the existing rather intuitive approach of policy making towards an evidence-driven approach enabled by big data, with regard to the management of the established CPS. When deciding which parking spots to change from one category to another, there are multiple factors to be taken into account: Economic, Environmental, Social. Taking into account the aforementioned, concrete evidence must be extracted from data obtained from the Municipal Police, the Economic Dpt. and the Environmental Dpt. of MoT. In case of insignificant change or of deterioration of the environmental conditions due to the proposed parking policy, next actions are to analyze the possible reasons and propose policy changes.
Resources needed
The investments into CPS are in total 34.871.850,00€ euros, funded by PPP (public-private partnership) and for the CUTLER project there is a total budget of 5.080.125,00€ and the budget for Thessaloniki is 241.250,00€ co-funded by the Horizon 2020 programme of the European Union.
Evidence of success
THESi combined with CUTLER’S platform are some of the most advanced & integrated technological systems in Europe with online functions, service interface, control and public information. It ensures 24/7 traffic & parking management, using tools that have increased the checks by 30% & it is Smart as 50% of parking is paid online. It allows faster decisions, encouraging the combination of different types of data for decision-making and it is easy to use. The total parking revenue is 13.552.785€.
Potential for learning or transfer
THESi is a technologically advanced parking solution. It improves the provision of parking spaces, increases their rate of rotation, prevents illegal parking on key roads, achieves environmental benefits and utilizes the use of new friendly communication and information data. Its operation is expected to have benefits to the sustainability and the image of the city, as well as for the operation of the market. CUTLER aims to differentiate from existing approaches by facilitating in this way a holistic approach to homogenize the heterogeneous sources of data. The growth and availability of municipal big datasets is an opportunity to develop tools for enabling data-driven urban planning and governance and will help in making environmentally sound decisions. THESi and its optimization through the CUTLER project is a practice that can be transferred to other European regions and cities that face challenges with congestion, on street parking and low air quality.
Further information
Website
Good practice owner
You can contact the good practice owner below for more detailed information.
Municipality of Thessaloniki