Motorists travelling to Woking town centre are to benefit from a seamless visitor and resident experience with a series of ticketless car park upgrades, including integration to the JustPark app.

Motorists travelling to Woking town centre are to benefit from a seamless visitor and resident experience with a series of ticketless car park upgrades, including integration to the JustPark app – making for a seamless visitor and resident experience.  The new parking technology will first be installed at the Victoria Way multi-story car park;  932 spaces available 24/7. It will be followed by Brewery Road, Heathside Crescent, Shoppers Yellow, Shoppers Blue and the newly-built Shoppers Red car park. The new parking infrastructure is delivered by Woking Borough Council and WPS, one the UK’s leading parking equipment providers.

The technology used is based on WPS’s innovative Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR):a driver’s number plate is read on entry to a car park and calculates the parking fee based on the length of stay. Motorists do not need to stop at a barrier at entry or exit, nor use a paper ticket.

More payment options

Before leaving, drivers have multiple payment options at the at WPS’ ParkAdvance™ pay stations: cash, chip & pin and contactless (including Apple and Google Pay), or via the JustPark app. Customers simply enter their car registration number at the pay station or enter a car park code in the app and –  once paid – exit barriers open automatically. A useful benefit of the JustPark app is the ‘AutoPay’ parking experience: regular users can exit and pay for their parking automatically by pre-registering their licence plate and payment details.

The changes will also: make it simpler for those with season ticket and permit customers to manage their parking; enable parking costs to be included in cinema and theatre bookings; and give retailers the opportunity to offer discounts on parking for their customers.

Benefits for customers and the planet

The new ticketless system is much greener too. The new technology removed the need for paper tickets, saving material and production costs, as well as removing customer issues around lost or faulty tickets. 

To help visitors efficiently find available spaces, new digital “VMS” signage will be installed both on approaching roads and in the new car parks – which help direct drivers to unoccupied spaces.

Hannah Fuller, Head of Partnerships for JustPark, says: “Putting together this brilliant solution is a testament to the collaborative abilities of WPS, JustPark and Woking Borough Council. We’ve worked very hard to create a seamless payment solution, which includes our new AutoPay feature, allowing customers to set up their account to debit automatically when they drive in and out without having to think about it. It’s great to see all this coming to fruition for the benefit of the residents and visitors of Woking.”

A seamless Customer Experience

Cllr David Bittleston, Leader of Woking Borough Council, praised the excellent working relationship between Woking Borough Council and WPS, which allowed an exacting brief to be developed. He said:“Our brief was for a seamless customer experience and an advanced system that matched the forward-thinking nature of the town’s regeneration, and this is exactly what we got.

“We are very excited about the enhanced, greener, parking experience that we will now be able to offer visitors to the town centre and can’t wait to welcome shoppers to their new, improved car parks.”

Simon Jarvis, Managing Director of WPS in the UK, says parking is a vital touch point in a visitor’s town centre experience:

“The council had a well thought out brief that allowed us to work in partnership with them, JustPark and other providers to fully-utilise the best systems and services available. We’ve been able to bring together an integrated suite of leading technologies to create a solution that delivers the utmost in flexibility, efficiency and convenience for Woking residents, commuters and visitors, as well as the Council.”

The installation follows WPS and JustPark’s 2020 British Parking Awards win in the ‘Parking Technology’ category for a solution that combines the benefits of WPS’ ParkAdvance™ pay-on-foot parking system with JustPark’s payment app technology, designed to enhance the customer experience at multiple car parks operated by Cornwall Council.