What can and should the University of Essex Do To Alleviate The Excess Demand For Parking Slots On Campus?
The University of Essex has the facilities of parking slots within the campus. The implication of the parking slots imply that the students retrieve benefit from the parking facilities as it reduces their time to allocate their vehicles and also the security of their vehicles are ensured through the facilities. The students of the university are alarmingly increasing the demand for the parking slots which has created a situation of excess demand. The excess demand drives up the price (Caicedo, 2012). As the university is located away from the town and near the highways, the facility of parking is rendered only by the university. This means that the university has substantial market power making the market to be monopoly. The excess demand may increase the price of the parking slots but the enormous power in the hands of the university will enable them to operate the market through price discrimination. The price discrimination is randomly applied by a monopolist in order to segment the customer and the markets into sub-markets and charge different prices to the different customers. This phenomenon will help the university to solve the problem of excess demand for parking slots and enable them to suppress the demand. The reason behind the excess demand is the non-availability of the sufficient parking spaces that the university can make it available to the students (Caicedo, Blazquez and Miranda, 2012). The different types of price discrimination can be applied in this framework through forecast of the number of students who use the parking slots based on the time and the zones of parking. Here different price can be charged to different students based on the segmentation of the parking into zones.
The factors that influence the demand and supply of the parking slots are determined in this project. Since the market is a monopoly type the supply is restricted to a single seller or provider of the parking space which is the university in this case. The demand is augmented by several students of the university who reach the premises through different types of vehicles. Since it is the monopoly market the university will be the price maker. Since it is the behavior of every driver to seek for suitable place for parking, the availability of proper parking facilities are relevant (Davor, Šoštarić and Ševrović, 2012). This is evident from the fact that the heated arguments are quite frequent when one driver steals or occupies the space of the other driver. The pricing decision of the drivers generally is influenced by the position of the parking space near to their destination. Like the drivers tend to pay high prices for those parking spaces which are near to the exit of the lane. This is because the more they are near to the exit point, the less time will they take to reach their destination, hence it involves high prices. The car trips taken by the individuals were believed to increase the demand for the car parking spaces. The need for adequate parking space is important because to reduce the impact of traffic in the highways and also for the commercial success of the owner of the parking space (Ewick, 2014). The parking facilities are important with respect to the traffic engineering. The widespread parking programs must incorporate the planning, design, construction, operation and price and charges of the parking facilities. When it comes to the university campus parking then the problem solving is different and do not fit the conventional approach.
The parking facilities of the University provides slots at various locations within the campus like at the library, administration building and at the staff and student apartment building. The facilities are available to the car parking and the motorcycles parking. Since the area of the parking is diverse, the university has segmented the parking areas into zones in order to segregate the vehicles of the students, the staffs and the guests. The parking area for the students are marked as yellow zone, for the staffs and the professors are marked as red zone and for guests and the visitors it is the green zone (Gnezdilov, 2012). The supply side of the parking is analyzed through the total area available for the parking, duration of the parking facilities, distribution of the parking slots and the zones violations of the parking rules and regulations and the yearly turnover rates of the parking services. Consumers’ preference view point the construction and designing of the parking space influences the design of the parking spaces. The utility derived by the consumers of the parking spaces are signified by the conventional indifference curve and the budget constraints of the consumers help to determine the equilibrium space for parking in the university. The supply of the parking spaces is fixed which implies that it is not analyzed in the short run. For the determination of the supply of the parking spaces, we must consider the parking spaces in the long run. The different regulations that will help to mitigate the excess demand for parking spaces are like the decrease in the traffic space and expanding the parking space supply, observing the duration of the parking so as to fine the consumers based on their violation of rules and several other solutions of the problem are discussed in this project (Graham-Rowe, 2012). Hence the aim of the project is to determine the solution that will help to alleviate the excess demand for the parking spaces within the university campus.
The aim and the objectives of the project:
Deductive Approach can be useful in gaining insight knowledge about the topic and research can be constructed on strong basis. The existing theories or concepts would be breakdown as per the requirements of the research study which would be supportive in explaining the topic in much detailed manner and at highest level (Guo and Guo, 2012). Therefore, the information regarding parking facility in context to the campus of University of Essex can be understood. On the other hand, the researcher could be able make an accurate link between the objectives of the research and existing models and theories.
In order to conduct the research for completing the research study in any scenario, researcher needs to design their work through a proper way. According to Bernard (2011), research design helps in describing the entire framework of the study. Through this process, research design analyzes the collected information with a significant way (Hesse-Biber, 2010). From the point of view of data collection for conducting the study, research design is a positive approach that needs to apply within the analysis process in terms of better description. Burns et al. (2008) suggested that there are three types of research design mainly used by the researcher in terms of analyzing the research study properly such as explanatory research, exploratory research and descriptive research. Majority of researcher used exploratory research design methods in terms of acknowledging the different types of ideas that helps in completing the research file properly. On the other hand, Crouch and Pearce (2012) cited that explanatory research design is used to describe the events of incidents of the occurrence ideas towards research objects that correspondently effect on the research study. Apart from that, researcher used explanatory research in terms of identifying the cause as well as effect of relationship between the information. Furthermore, Toloie-Eshlaghy et al. (2011) argued that explanatory research design is also used for penetrating the details analysis of the research regarding limitation of information. On the contrary, descriptive research design is used for gaining the details of the stated information as well as information regarding several events with the proper description and details.
Therefore, for this study, researcher used the explanatory research design method because, the selected topic has not enough information in the secondary resources. Therefore, ideas as well as thought regarding the selected topic need to be generate. Explanatory research design method allowed the researcher in generating the information as well as concept of longitudinal study for this particular topic (Truscott et al. 2010). Moreover, through the explanatory research design method, researcher was able to generate the ideas as well as thought regarding the selected topic. Furthermore, through the explanatory research design method, researcher of this particular study was able to provide the support with proper information in the application of possible ideas r methods that allows in defining the suitable way for parking slot within the campus at the University of Essex.
For the purpose of current study, secondary research will be focused upon. The secondary research will provide valuable information regarding the parking issues related to number of Universities. Moreover, the research will be useful in understanding the level of demand by the students and other people for the parking spaces in University Campus. As a result, the information would be useful in further analysis and gaining effective result which can be compared with the University of Essex. Apart from that, the secondary research would also help the researcher in knowing the supply of parking facilities to the users. Thus, a relation can be known between demand and supply of parking services in the university campus. On the other hand, secondary research would be effective in getting learning about the regulation that is related to parking system. Therefore, for undertaking secondary research, different methods will be used such as internet, existing journals, published report on parking facilities and system, books, etc (Houston and Pearson, 2011). These all will be useful in gaining insight knowledge about the University and its dealing with the demand and supply of parking system. Furthermore, the secondary research can be effective in explaining different topics or theories in much more detailed manner. As a result, it would be well accepted by the readers and acceptance level of the study could be increased.
For this particular research work, researcher followed the each and every stapes as well as guideline that provided by the University of Essex. Apart from that, researcher also ensured the ethical behavior as well as the professionals along with the purpose of protecting gathered information. Moreover, for this study, researcher ensured the rights of privacy as well as the honesty of keeping information safe throughout the professionals. Furthermore, according to the permission of Institutional Review Board of the University of Essex, researcher collected the entire secondary information for validating the study in a better manner. Researcher took the permission from the higher authority of University of Essex before collecting any information regarding the process of the effective way that minimize the problem of parking slot within university campus. Apart from that, researcher keeps the entire information in a safe place and promised that it never used for any professional work. Researcher also reassured that all the information is protected from any types of harm. Researcher also ensured that this study is protected from identities as well as voluntary (Hair and Money, 2011). This ethical method demonstrates that information was protected from the harm. In order to avoid the deception regarding collection of information from the secondary resources, researcher also complemented the ethical assurance. Researcher also maintains the hierarchy for submitting the report to the University properly.
The key limitation for this particular research study was that identification of weak information. The selected research topic is unique and has nt much information in the secondary resources. Therefore, researcher was unable to collect large amount of information to support the description of this study. Apart from that, budget was also another key limitation for this study. Due to low budget, researcher was unable to verify the study with SPSS software application. That demonstrates that the ideas or information is not verified properly. Moreover, time is also another big factor for this research study. In order to complete this particular work, researcher got short of time. Therefore, researcher was unable to collect lot of information for providing support to the selected topic or research work.
Increase Parking Supply
It is understood that parking zone is very less in number close to University of Essex. Due to that factor, the parking market of University falls into monopoly. On the other hand, University is not able to guarantee that they can be able to provide space next time to the students or other people. Therefore, University has to plan effective strategies that can help in increase the parking space and better service can be provided to car parkers. Apart from that, it is known that students park their vehicles and roam whole day and due to that other people or students did not get space to park their cars. Due to the monopoly nature of parking market, the students are charged high price for parking vehicle (Houston and Pearson, 2011). Therefore, in order to increase the parking supply, the above problem has to be solved. The University should not take advantage of being monopoly and fair price has to be charged from the students. Furthermore, in order to increase the parking space, the University should not allow parking car for the people that resides near to University and first preference should be given to the students that are coming from far areas. Therefore, it can be discussed that if parking supply is not increased quickly then it can lead to congestion and it can become difficult to arrange arriving cars (Hoxley, 2012).
Apart from that, the size of the parking zone has to be increased and its capacity. It would be effective in engaging more numbers of vehicles in one time. As a result, the more students can be able to park their car and then go to their classes. Moreover, management of University can ask government to build parking facilities in order to help the students with parking. Furthermore, the transaction costs can be controlled and students and other visiting person can be able to park their car in fewer costs (Ji et al., 2014). On the contrary, the University has to take care of disadvantage that may arise due to increasing parking supply. The development of larger parking space can be costly for the developers or governments. It would also increase the business overhead costs and due to that University may not be able to complete other necessary work. It is known that minimum construction charge is $1500 per space which can rise up to $22000per space according to location. University of Essex is located far from town and due to that University may have to bear around $8000 per space for increasing parking space (Kim, 2012). However, it would be of much support for the students to park their vehicles.
It has been observed from the report of University of Bristol that they have increased their parking supply by 30% which helped them to assemble 200 vehicles in one time. Therefore, if University of Essex also follows the similar step then it would be beneficial in accumulating large number of vehicles and students can be able to use the service with ease (Lu, 2015). Moreover, it has been noticed that many University allows illegal parking to other people. Therefore, it prohibits students to park cars. Thus, University of Essex should allow such activity and students and University staffs should be given first preference to park cars in the campus.
Address Variable Demand
In order to park the vehicle, demand varies according to the prospect of people. There are number of personalities that demand for parking services such as parking brokerage services department, students, professors and others. The parking brokerage services are engaged in providing parking space on lease to Universities so that increasing demand of parking space can be fulfilled. On the other hand, in order to provide services to the Universities, the brokerages services can charge significant amount on each lease term (Manohar, 2012). Apart from giving on lease, they can provide parking space on rent too and charge fees for the service on monthly basis. As a result it would be useful for the University to deal with the increasing demand and requirement of parking space. On the contrary, addressing demand for parking would be useful for the University in planning to solve parking problems. As a result, University can be able to generate quick, efficient and flexible solution. In addition to that, University has also acknowledge negative aspects while addressing and countering variable demand such as administrative institutions and designing whole new plan. The University management may not able to find expertise personnel that help in solving the parking issues.
Apart from above discussion, University can receive much needed support from Parking Brokerage Services. They can help in making parking space available that may be close to University of Essex. The University can make deal with Transportation Management Associations (TMA) as they can be provided best transportation services in parking the students’ vehicle. Moreover, the support from TMA would be cost effective for University and can encourage student to make best utilization of available parking facilities (Hoxley, 2012). On the other hand, the local government agency can be of great help as well in solving the parking issues. They can help in the arrangement of parking facilities as it would be effective for University in making large space for car parking. Furthermore, it is has been observed that variable priced is charged for meeting the variable demand. Therefore, University could be able to arrange better space for parking large percent of vehicles on particular day. For instance, the car that comes for parking during morning time then downtown parking fees can be discounted and further can be increased during the afternoon time (Lu, 2015). Therefore, it would be useful in meeting variable demand.
Moreover, marketing efforts would be adopted by the University in order to promote morning shift as an inexpensive period to park vehicles. As a result, it would be effective in shifting some of the parking which would result in more parking spaces for others. Apart from that, University may have to face certain ambiguity in adopting such strategy to address demand. University may need to implement parking pricing systems in order to gain higher advantage from variable pricing (May and Pitt, 2012). Moreover, it can give rise to spillover issues which means high amount of parking congestion. On the other hand, demand is more than supply due to fixing price for parking below than marginal costs. The demand is not able to meet by University as some students falsely report that they reside in distant areas and it leads to shortage of parking space. Therefore, University may have to check the validity of student’s personal details.
On the other hand, development of overflow parking plan can be effective in dealing the parking demand during occasional periods. Universities would be organizing annual function, sports, cultural events, counseling, etc. In that period, number of visitors increases with the increase in vehicles. Therefore, it becomes difficult for the Universities to organize parking facilities for the visitors (Ni, Ma and Xia, 2012). The overflow parking plan would be useful in arranging parking space during such kind of event. As a result, University of Essex can be able to control demand of people and best parking services can be provided.
Reduce Parking Demand
The increasing demand for the parking space can be a huge pressure for any business, organizations or Universities. It becomes important duty for them to maintain the demand so that each one can be able to avail parking facilities. In that context, it can be discussed that University of Essex has to decrease the excess demand for the parking zone. The people have to be encouraged to decrease the automobile travel. It is understood that, people most of the time park their vehicle for long hours and engage themselves into some useless activities. Therefore, it forbids other people to park their cars. On the other hand, reducing the automobile travel will make the parking space available for others. Moreover, the people can be encouraged to shift to other destinations for parking vehicle. As a result, students and University staff would be able to gain parking spaces and also demand could be decreased.
Furthermore, decreasing the parking demand would be quick, flexible and cost effective approach in controlling the problems of parking. The parking congestion would be decreased and University would be able to save facility costs as well. On the contrary, the University can face certain problem such as University can register negative word of mouth from certain people by not letting them to park vehicle (Oh, 2014). Apart from that, University can ask jurisdiction of government to widen the street so that on-street parking can be provided to the needy. This would be useful in decreasing the demand and students would be able to park their car or bikes on on-street parking if parking space is not available in the campus. On the other hand, the users may not be able to pay high duty for the parking zone. It also provides flexibility to park the vehicle any time.
The charging of motorists for making use of parking facilities even for a small area would help in decreasing the demand. As charging price for small area can create great travel impact on the people and as a result, they would be not willing to park their bikes in the campus. On the other hand, it has been seen that, people and students that do not get chance to park in the campus; they normally park on the street which makes tough for others to travel. Therefore, the University can complain to traffic municipality authority which would help in decreasing the parking demand. Apart from that, University can charged different prices from students, staffs and other people. As a result, some people may find that price charged is higher for them then it would be effective in decreasing the demand of users for parking facilities (Simićević, Milosavljević and Maletić, 2012). On the other side, special parking taxes would be useful in controlling total parking demand and it would be helpful for University of Essex to provide parking facilities to people that actually need it. Furthermore, decreasing the parking time limit would be effective in decreasing the demand. The car which is found in the parking space for more then set time limit then the responsible person can be charged. As a result, it would prevent the students or other people to decrease their travelling time and parking frequency (Tezcan, 2012).
Use Existing Parking Capacity More Efficiently
The usage of existing parking capacity is important as it provides proper allocation for maintaining the transport demand for reasons. The effective strategies in capacity modeling provides in maintaining the load factors in various times of the day for allocating the place for the vehicles in the parking lot of university. The strategies that can be used in purpose of enhancing parking capacity without increasing the area of parking lot needs some well built strategy to implement so that authority might be able to provide service in an optimum way (Tucker, Turley and Holgate, 2014). There are some following strategies that can be adopted by the concerned authority:
Communication with users
The details information of parking might be an effective strategy for the university authority for providing service facility to the neighbors of area. As stated by Van Ommeren and Wentink (2012), a methodical communication process from the authority might help the users in using the parking bay effectively while it is argued by Wang, Li and Huang (2012), stating that accurate information at real time is impossible to convey to users. Otherwise the strategy of communicating with the users is cost-effective as well as it is helpful in evaluating the impact of making the changes in strategies.
Remote parking
Remote parking is a method where regular and long time parkers use the remote area of the city, thus reducing the problems in city of arranging more vehicles at peak hour. As observed by (), this facility might increase the cost of shuttle service for parking cost.
Regulate parking
The controlled environment in a parking lot might provide the users to be allocated maximum in numbers which may be advantageous in serving at time of peak hours (Wang, 2015). According to Wenbo and Khan (2012), regulated parking in every place provides the authority in using the capacity in an optimum way increasing the profitability from service business due to lowering the breakeven point.
Improvement of pedestrians
The place for sidewalks and walking paths for users in parking lot might be problematic for reducing the space for parking as a whole, thereby; reduction and appropriately designed pedestrians may enhance place for parking and safety for the walkers. However, the financial inclusion and required land might be a bigger problem to apply this strategy (Yousif and Purnawan, 2004).
Shared parking
The most common and applied technique in reducing parking issues is shared parking technique where problems aroused due to less parking space can be reduced effectively. In this point of view, parking lot of University of Essex having capacity of 300 vehicles at a time while authority might allow at least 450 vehicles to be parked in the assigned space using this technique. The regular users of this facility are working people and stay in the office at the time of peak hour, while other users are allowed to use those places with shared facility for perking their vehicles. The advantage of using the share service system provides cost benefit to the users as well as the authority (Caicedo, Blazquez and Miranda, 2012). Further, the schedule of share service may be divided into peak hours where authority might allocate more vehicles even in holidays to visitors of opened institutions on that day. The disadvantage of this facility is requirement of more manpower.
Accessibility
The accessibility of the perking place might generate to users an advantage of least congestion in parking lot and also help in using the land allotted for the parking facility. Accessibility management provides the users benefit of security and their choice of transportation (Caicedo, 2012).
Accuracy and flexibility in parking
The projected parking demand of the area is essential in this matter as it provides authority in planning capacity accurately (Gnezdilov, 2012). In many locations, the parking requirements become higher whereas low in value for better accessible places. Therefore, the price for parking becomes low in better accessible point. In this case flexibility may be helpful in projecting the demand of the vehicles for parking. It requires extensive planning and evaluation of plan as per the volatility comes into effect.
Overflow and responses
The overflow in the parking lot of university premises might create turbulent situation as it increases the traffic problems in the local area and also might create trouble for the regular users of parking place. As criticized in research paper of (Graham-Rowe, 2012), stating that overflow in a parking place may provide cheaper parking and a resultant of failure of parking management. The opposite view from the research of (Houston and Pearson, 2011), states that more human resources need to be administered and the parking facility might face loss in a longer notes as the way out traffic may be imperative for any occasional reason and not sustaining for many days. The regulation and pricing of parking might be helpful in restricting this problem. The increase in price for parking might reduce the demand of the parking of vehicles as it makes motorists to find out alternative place for parking. The strict regulation of controlling the operation of facility will provide the authority to control the operation smoothly. It is therefore provides the solution of controlling the parking spaces effectively in rearranging extra space for vehicles (Rotaris and Danielis, 2014). It provides advantage of quick response in making solution of problems related to this matter at the least cost. The overflow of vehicles might make problems for the regular motorists in the place of university parking zone as they might face problems of not getting space for parking on those special days when there might be college festival and other programs in local area. This problem has a common solution for the authority of paying compensation to the regular motorists. However, the opposition of this solution states that efficiency of the management of parking is reduced for this reason and also it increases the cost of the reason (Brett and Menzies, 2014). In addition to this, the defenders of this theorem support this method of compensating the regular facility users as they think that this method reduces the chance of hampering of image of authority in a short (Cools, van der Waerden and Janssens, 2013).
Management and design
Managing the operation is crucial for allocating proper parking facility in the University parking premises. According to Council (2012), management is possible by proper strategy in allocating the vehicles in parking facility and quick decision making might be more conclusive at the time of emergency. Design of the parking area is a convenient method of getting solution for regular basis. Design of the facility in university parking place deals with the layout design of the parking facility and also it is associated with the integrated management of perking of vehicles such as security, safety etc. as stated by Loukaitou-Sideris et al. (2014), improvement in enforcement provides maintaining the facility of operation of parking facility. Further, strict enforcement provides honesty in using the vehicles for motorists and also it enhances the capacity building of parking facility overall. The appropriate enforcement of the operation allows the facility utilization in a friendly manner. It provides the users to correlate with the changed rules and facilities in the parking lot of the university and also it reduces the confusion due to changes made in the regular operational module. The facility users will get the benefit of more enforcements in this matter while reduces the interruption in operation (Linjie and Kefei, 2013).
Design
Design of parking facility might be considered as it present universally using by the standards for a parking facility. The universal design of a parking facility includes the facility the university premises requires more open spaces for its core functional policy of research and learning ambience for the students and the scholars. Due to that reason, the design of the parking facility in this context will be different from the traditional design to maintain the appropriateness of its policies. Therefore, the design of the facility for 300 cars will be a simple field based open-air space. This design will decrease the operating cost of the facility and also reduce the cost for the users as well. As stated by Douglas et al. (2015), site design is utmost important for selecting the location while serving the customers with its location of the site.
Visualization
The visualization of the parking place is an option for the authority to attract the users to use that facility making a brand image in their mind. Therefore, it incurred more cost in developing the facility as a whole (Kelly and Clinch, 2012). It is observed from the research of Charilaos, Sivakumar and Polak, (2015), large parking facility does not make the ambience of attractive due to reduce the cost associated with operation and maintenance of the facility. In this context, the university authority need not to care about the ambience artistic value as it does not enhance value of the university as they are the sole provider of service of vehicle parking in that area. The artistic approach of the facility might reduce the efficiency of the facility as it restricts the usage in many sections.
Accessibility
Accessibility is a matter of concern in developing the design of a parking lot where an appropriate way in and out must be present. It is therefore, an essential requirement for the facility to utilize the accessing points for users fast and at ease. As stated by Kim (2012), accessing is an important concept for increasing the utility factor of facility that might reduce the complex operational aspects in the facility. For 300 vehicles in the parking lot, university will have two in and out point as it will reduce the traffic outside of the compound. Further, reciprocity in accessing will also reduce the enforcement in the facility thus reducing the cost associated with the operation. The acc
Constructional effectiveness
A change in constructional materials also provides the facility holders in reducing the maintaining cost of the parking lot. Therefore, university needs to use pervious materials for reducing the cost associated with maintaining the pavement. It also allows the university to get subsidy for resisting water pollution and land pollution as a onetime cost from the government. Further, it also provides the university authority in maintaining the area of parking facility without any major repairing for decade.
It has been found out from the research that the capacity of parking space is low at University of Essex and due to that demand of the people or visitors is not completely fulfilled. As a result, some students or other people park their vehicle outside the campus which leads to congestion outside and also inside the campus. Moreover, the University of Essex acknowledged complaints from surroundings and traffic municipality (Lu, 2015). Therefore, University took important decision to alleviate the rising demand for the parking facility in the campus. On the other hand, the demand curve determination has helped to show the result about the actual demand for the parking space. It has been found from the demand estimation that demand is much higher than the supply of parking space.
Thus, it has been seen that rate of demand is higher in comparison rate of supply of parking space in University of Essex’s campus. The visiting in campus is so frequent that many students or other visitors are not able to get a place for parking their vehicles. Apart from that, it has been found from the site of University of Essex that university does not allow option to the students that reside in University accommodation within the campus for parking the vehicles. Moreover, if any student that lives off campus and want to park their car in the campus then it is mandatory for them to get them enroll for parking permit (Manohar, 2012). As an effect of that it helps in controlling the excess demand and arranging enough parking spaces that has valid parking permit.
Apart from that, it has been also acknowledged that University of Essex can gain much needed support from combining with Multi Decked Car Park which is located at Colchester Road. Therefore, increasing demand can be controlled. Through this unity visitors or students can be allowed to park their vehicle and can be charged significant amount for the service. It has been mentioned that if people park for around 2 hours, they will be charged £2.40, for three hours £3.10, for four hours £3.50, for six hours £5.70 and for seven hours and above £8.60 (Oh, 2014). Therefore, it has been found that the price is pretty much costlier for the students and this helps in decreasing the excess demand and it also helps in reducing travelling frequency of students with vehicles. Furthermore, it has also been found from the secondary research that Southend Campus of University of Essex is located at centre and due to that public transport is easily accessible. Therefore, students are promoted and motivated to make use of public transport instead on travelling in personal vehicles (Propheter and Hatch, 2014). As a result, demand for parking space is managed and parking congestion in the campus is controlled. Moreover, travelling through public transport would help the students to decrease their cost related to buying fuel for the vehicle. Thus, students are able to save money and do not have to worry about car parking.
On the other hand, the other campus of University that is Colchester Campus has build parking space that consume only 170 vehicles at one time. Moreover, the parking space is only for the students and not for other staffs or visitors. As an outcome, the demand for parking from other people is managed and is not allowed to park even on request. Therefore, it is effective in making parking spaces available for students (Tezcan, 2012). On the contrary, it has found that some campus in University of Campus does not look into whether the vehicle is registered or not for the parking. Due to that many vehicles are parked into the campus which prohibits other students that possess legal parking registration or passes. Therefore, it is a problem in managing the demand of the students and other people. Moreover, it demand is not managed then it would result into chaos and conflict can arise between students or management for providing parking space.
Moreover, it has been found that campus charges different daily price for all types of parking whether it is motor vehicles or four wheelers. The vehicles that are registered are charged 10p for each hour and 70p for whole day. On the other hand, occasional-use permit holders are charged £2.10 for whole day and 30p for an hour (Wang, Li and Huang, 2012). Therefore, that are able to meet such parking charge terms are allowed to park their vehicle in the campus parking zone and that are not able to meet it are not allowed. Furthermore, it has been found that number of vehicle visiting has aroused in quick time which has made difficult for the campus to manage the parking space demand.
On the other hand, it has also been found from the information of consumers that University of Essex should increase the parking capacity and building can be built for accommodating maximum vehicles arriving. The shortage of capacity has led to increase in demand for the parking slots which has increased the pressure for the University to meet the demand. Moreover, due to shortage, the students are having problem that are coming far areas for study and attending class. Therefore, students are not able to attend classes on time due to getting engage in solving parking problem. On the other side, it has been seen that some campus such as Loughton Campus does not give much importance on the vehicles that are coming from far areas (Wang, 2015). Therefore, parking is allowed to the visitors or students that are coming from nearby areas. As a result of that, the far residing students are excluded from getting parking space. Therefore, it leads to increase in the demand for the parking slots. On the contrary, the University is not able to tackle the demand for parking as constructing the new parking facilities is expensive. Furthermore, it has been known from the research that rising on-street parking would be a possible solution for the University to check the demand. Apart from that, the University can receive better support from consumers. They provides effective ideas such as not allowing non-campus member to park their cars as it will help in alleviating demand for parking slot (Guo and Guo, 2012).
Parking lot in University of Essex is maintained through set of rules and schedule by the authority. It is observed from the existing schedule that Colchester campus Car Park A has no stalls for the visitors and there are 170 stall are reserved for the students only in valley car park. Cost for registration for the students and staff is £23 and daily charges are 10p/hour or 70p whole day at the time of term. Occasional riders have to pay 30p/hour or £2.1/per day. For motorcycle, there is no charge either for registration or rent for parking in the university area but the motorists have to park their bike in the selected places. The campus also allow the visitors to park their vehicles in the university campus at many places – Multi-storey car parking, Car park B, Valley car park, North Towers car park, Wivenhoe House and Parkside car park. The numbers of slots available for the visitors from 9.30 am to 4.30 pm and designated price is given in the following table as follows:
|
Place of parking |
Numbers of cars |
Duration |
parking charges |
|
Multi-storey car parking |
680 |
9.30 am – 4.30 pm |
For 2 hours £2.4 3 hours £3.10 4 hours £3.5 6 hours £5.7 9 hours £8.6 |
|
Car park B |
190 |
9.30 am – 4.30 pm |
|
|
Valley car park |
380 (170 reserved for the students) |
9.30 am – 4.30 pm |
|
|
North Towers car park |
260 |
9.30 am – 4.30 pm |
|
|
Wivenhoe House |
290 (only for the guest in this house) |
9.30 am – 4.30 pm |
|
|
Parkside car park |
390 |
9.30 am – 4.30 pm |
Table 1: Colchester campus – car parking details
(Source: Essex.ac.uk, 2015)
From the above table it is observed that university authority is providing the parking facility of total numbers of 1730 for general visitors from 9.30 am to 4.30 pm. Further, it is also seen that 290 vehicles can be parked in the Wivenhoe house for the guests only in that house and also 170 are reserved for the students in valley car park. The rate of the charges to park in the university area is also given in the above table where we might observed that there is no slots for parking less than one hour for the visitors. Therefore, they have to consider for at least two hours or more. Further the slabs of charges shows that after 4 hours, a visitor has to take the facility o f 6bhours either or 9 hours. A visitor can get a slot for 4 hours and further 3 hours which might cost him £3.5+£3.1 = £6.6, providing the visitor per hour charge at £.942 while if the visitor take the option of 9 hours where per hour cost is £.955. Therefore, authority is charging higher for the visitors using the car parking facility for more time. It is also observed that university authority allowed almost all the parking facility to the local community after 5.30pm for parking their cars. The parking facilities such as multi-storey, car park B, valley and north tower car park are facilitated with the electronic displays are present for providing direction to the visitors and also it take charges from the visitors using the coin vending machine and do not entertain any change or credit cards. The policy of authority does not permit to make any ‘money back’ for unused ticket.
For the Southend campus, there are many parking lot as the campus is in the middle fo the city. There are two locations of parking in the university surroundings – Town centre and central seafront. There are five places where a visitor or a student can park his/her car – Essex street, the Victoria, Tylers avenue, University square, Warrior square accounting total numbers of spaces for the cars of 1688. The central seafront are also can accommodate 1150 cars and vehicles at a time composing of three places – Fairheads green, Seaway and Western Esplanade. Parking charges of these places is normally starts with £1.1 per hour and increases for every hour and it can be observed in the following table:
|
Duration of parking |
Charges in £ |
|
1 hour |
1.1 |
|
2 hour |
1.9 |
|
3 hour |
2.7 |
|
4 hour |
4.7 |
|
5 hour |
5.7 |
|
6 hour |
7 |
|
7 hour |
11 |
|
Location |
Spaces |
|
Essex street |
194 |
|
The Victoria |
622 |
|
Tylers Avenue |
244 |
|
University square |
289 |
|
Warrior Square |
339 |
|
Fairheads Green |
189 |
|
Seaway |
474 |
|
Western Esplanade |
487 |
Table 2 and 3: Southend campus – car parking details
(Source: Southend.gov.uk, 2015)
Figure 1: rate of change in hourly rate of parking
Up to first three hours, the charges for parking cars in these places are going downwards while from the 4th hour, the charges has risen sequentially as seen from the graph. The slope of the graph has shown that has increased steadily after 3rd hour of charging for parking. It is also true that rate of car parking after 6th hour will increase in this steady mode as the slope of the line of that portion is much stiff towards normal. The parking facility is also not free on Sunday and the regular time hours for parking on week days is 9 am to 6 pm. The authority provides coupons for using the parking facility, while university has no authority in controlling the parking zone so it cannot be used for the local community at free of cost after the rush hour.
From the above figure and tables, the depicted data informs that car parking facility in two campuses of Essex University is totally different as well the policies and rules too. Due to this discrepancy, the analyzed data states that in both places the policy for pricing the charge for the longer duration of parking is same as in higher order of rate as it may reduce the over demand of parking facility in the surroundings. It is also found that there are no rules clearly stated for overuse of parking slot except that it will charge the higher slab rate for overusing of parking slot. Further, it is also observed that authority do not use the reserved parking places for the staff and students for commercial purpose for a short-term gain. It is also analyzed that overcharging per hour rate in case of longer duration use of parking lot has considered the tactics of decreasing rate of excess demand of parking places in both the campus.
An integrated plan is recommended that might resolve the issue for the authority of university. Further, it is recommended that the parking plan must be resemblance with the scope and problems associated with the current context. The plan must be flexible enough because of change in policies of facility all of a sudden and the policy can be shifted towards the change as required. The integrated plan will involve the design of the site and also analyze the accessibility of the facility as a large. The design has to constitute a way for walking in the facility for the users’ convenience. The problems related to parking on regular basis and the optimism in operation of facility in point of view from the authority. From the operational point of view, the parking must be integrated with the strategic planning of the university as it is a facility to the nearby community service of the institution. It is also true that community service might not be much profitable for the university despite enjoying the monopoly in the market. It is also recommended to the authority of the parking place that they must make a evaluation process for the service of the facility to the community. The emphasis must be given to the local people as it provides the university in developing a long-term relationship with the neighbors. The authority must need to develop an implementation plan for the parking facility as it will ground the new strategy for making the operation uninterrupted in future. It is also recommended that on the course of any festive season, university must use the unused place for parking of the vehicles coming from outside the community so that it does not need to reduce the cost of compensation for every festival conducted in area and in university compound.
Further, it is also recommended that university must take different strategy for the two campuses as those campuses are different from their infrastructure as a whole. Therefore, it is a fact that all the tactics that will be recognized correct for the Colchester campus might not be right for the campus Southend. It is also recommended for the Colchester campus that authority must use the shared service facility so that it may extends the parking facility and also may reduce the operating cost when the demand has fallen drastically. This strategy will allow the university to extend its community service more as it will allow the neighbors to park their vehicles I n the university premises for the whole day. It is observed from the analysis that university has provided the outside visitors for parking their car at a two hours slab as it may express the monopolistic commercial policy from the university. Therefore, it is recommended that authority must increase the slab rate per hour of the longer duration users of parking facility in the area but the rate slab must marinating one hour slab for higher duration too. It is also recommended to the university authority to use more enforcement for maintaining the service of the parking besides the electronic automation for showing direction and maintaining the rules in the parking bay. It is also recommended that university must not charge money for parking from the disabled persons and provides enforcements for them in the parking facility. It will extend the service to community from the university point of view much more.
Conclusion
From the above case, it might be concluded that current parking facility is not serving enough to the local community of Essex. Further, economically it is inefficient too as it provides the service of parking to the local community regularly and does not share the space of the regular vehicles. Therefore, authority needs to change its planning and operational schedule as a whole so that it may run the operation economically. Further, management needs to increase the efficiency of the facility as there is huge traffic in front of the university gate at the time of rush hour. It is also problematic for the local people as they have to face the traffic every day at time of rush hour. The efficiency enhancement will allow the institute in increase the capacity of service within the existing service capacity physically.
From the above case, it might be concluded that current parking facility is not serving enough to the local community of Essex. Further, economically it is inefficient too as it provides the service of parking to the local community regularly and does not share the space of the regular vehicles. Therefore, authority needs to change its planning and operational schedule as a whole so that it may run the operation economically. Further, management needs to increase the efficiency of the facility as there is huge traffic in front of the university gate at the time of rush hour. It is also problematic for the local people as they have to face the traffic every day at time of rush hour. The efficiency enhancement will allow the institute in increase the capacity of service within the existing service capacity physically. This study demonstrated that increase of parking supply will be the better methodologies for solution of parking slot within the University campus of Essex. According to the research study, several principles have to follow by the management of the University of Essex in terms of increasing parking supply. In the downtown place of the University, need to insure the supply of parking for the office users. Apart from that, the people that need to park their vehicles with in the campus of University of Essex have to be more convenient with their rights. Apart from that, proper plan for future reuse and building of occupancy in the parking place of the University of Essex will be better way. As a resource, need to recognize the value of facilities of parking. Furthermore, addressing the parking demand, according to the desire criteria have to be perfect. In a proper place, one member has to involve and provide decision to the riders of vehicle for parking in a proper way. The parking place have to be high occupancy as well as more frequent in terms of moving of vehicles. Apart from that, from the above discussion, it has been analyzed that revenue of paring with an adequate supply of safe will be the key method for convenient parking. Parking management strategies will be also effective for increasing paring slot within the campus of University of Essex.
Through the above analysis it has been seen that use if existing parking facilities in a better way will be the key method of increasing parking slot within the campus of University of Essex. Shared parking will be the key strategy that alleviates the demand of parking slot in the University of Essex campus. According to the peak parking demand, the people of the University of Essex including students and teachers have to park their vehicles. This is the appropriate way of better using existing parking slot within the campus of the University. Increase of existing facilities will be also another method of increasing parking slot at University of Essex. Using the wasted place, valet parkers, angel parking, small stalls, revise time restriction, etc will are the key methods of increasing existing parking capacity. This process helps in using spaces or utilizing the existing space in parking slot of the university. Remote parking is also another way of increase parking facility for the University of Essex. Through providing the off-site parking facilities to the people of the University including teachers and students, need to provide facilities of additional parking. It helps in increasing available spaces. Overflow parking plans such as manage occasional peak like college events, functions, special occasion like fresher’s day celebration etc can fulfill the demand of parking. Improvement of bicycling as well as walking condition within the people of the University can help in saving the spaces of parking at campus of University of Essex. It can help in reducing the demand of parking as well as once park at the campus of University of Essex. Facilities of bicycling such as storage and changing the facilities can helps in reducing the demand of parking.
Mobility management such as encouraging efficient travel patterns such as timing, mode, frequency, etc also can help in reducing the parking demand as well as the spread of parking demand. Parking pricing such as charges for the motor vehicles within the campus of the University of Essex may allows in reducing the parking demand of the students as well as recovering the spaces of parking. It helps in increasing the turnover rate of the most convenient spaces within the campus of University of Essex. Improvement of enforcement such as ensure the regulation of consent, fair, efficiency, etc will be the key method for decreasing the higher demand of parking at the campus of University of Essex. Use of technology regarding parking space sensor, license plate reorganization can assist in increasing the most convenient spaces within the campus of Essex University. Smart parking is also another method of increasing parking slot within the Essex University campus. The technology of smart parking allows the University in providing real time guidance about the available spaces as well as the condition of parking reservation to the people. It can helps in managing the parking slot in a better way. During the peak hours of the University, remote parking programs will be effective as well as efficient way of alleviating the demand of parking slot within the campus. It helps in increasing the supply of available space for the students as well as teachers of the University of Essex. Reform of time limit can allows in escalating the time based parking at the campus of University of Essex. It helps in increasing the customer convenience. Improvement of marketing as well as improvement of information about parking can helps in alleviating the demand of parking at the campus of University of Essex. Providing accurate as well as convenient information regarding the parking space availability through maps, brochures, etc can helps in alleviating the demands for parking slot at University of Essex. It helps in utilizing the available space at University of Essex campus. Apart from that, this process will also helps in improving the satisfaction of the teachers as well as students of the University of Essex.
Therefore, comprehensive plan according to the requirement as well as demand of the people can allows in building a suitable way of parking within the campus of University of Essex that mitigate or alleviate the demand of parking slot. Proper parking management plan with effective strategies can help in alleviating the parking slot demand amongst the people that involved with the University of Essex.
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