As people buy cars each day, the demand for more parking spaces increases. Parking industries have become quite common over the last five years, and they include the latest technologies. One of the most common techniques that businesses use is parking control systems.

The Parking Industry

You might have plans in creating a parking business soon, but you have no idea where to start. While business owners have different ways to approach a problem, they share common knowledge. One of the essential parts of a parking business is parking management.

To understand how the parking system works, you need to know the basics of the parking industry. There are two main factors to consider in parking management, which are revenue generation and access control. As a parking industry, you need to focus on providing parking spaces for the people, while generating revenue.

To maximise your revenue, you have to optimise your access control through parking control systems. These systems reduce the number of staff and small, redundant mistakes that people make, such as mistyping plate numbers or delays in issuing receipts.

These systems help you to organise your parking spaces for your convenience, as well as the users. With proper monitoring and regular maintenance, you’ll have little or no problem in managing your parking business. 





 Some of the most common parts of the parking control system include:
  • Access Control Pedestal
  • Card Readers and Credential
  • Ticket Box
  • Gate Barrier
  • Parking Space Protector
  • Access Control Software, Displays, and Sensors
You don’t have to own every technology that entails parking control systems. You just have to include what is necessary for your business and make improvements in areas that need improvements. Knowing these types of hardware, you need to understand how each plays a part in your parking system.


How Does the Parking Control System Work?

There are only three necessary steps that govern the system and the hardware involved in each step is for monitoring and security purposes. These steps are vital to identifying the three critical aspects of the parking system.

1. The Entrance

A customer drives to your parking lot and halts at the designated space. At the entrance, you have your gate barriers to tell the driver where to stop for inspection. You can do a manual review by one of your staff, or you can install cameras that monitor the car at different angles.

The ticket box is optional, but most parking systems include one to indicate the drivers where to park or to tell you how many cars have entered your vicinity. The tickets can also show the time that they started using the parking space. After the inspection or once the ticket has been issued, the gate barrier opens to let the car in.

2. The Parking Space

Unless indicated on the ticket, you can install parking guidance systems to suggest that the parking space underneath it is vacant. Some parking systems include parking space protectors to prevent drivers from transferring from one area to another. In automation, these protectors can be activated and deactivated by the ticket issued at the entrance.

Once the car is parked, the parking guidance system will indicate, usually by a red light, that space is already taken. The driver can now lock the car and leave it there for some time.

3. The Exit

Once people are finished with their respective business, they return to the parking space, and deactivate the parking space protectors, if any. Some parking systems prefer to let users pay their dues before leaving the parking space, and some prefer to make them pay at the exit.

Before exiting you can either manually receive the payment, or install a set of access control readers to allow users to pay using their credit cards. At the exit, you can also have a gate barrier that activates after confirming the payment of users.

As a parking business, you should anticipate different types of users, namely transient and non-transient users. You need to be able to identify non-transient users, who leave their cars for a week or longer or use your parking lot more frequently than others.

You can do this by giving them exclusive cards that they can present at the entrance. You can also issue stickers for their car that your parking system can automatically identify so they can enter and leave whenever they want to.

The Bottom Line

It’s beneficial to own each of the latest technology that involves the parking control system. This ensures you to have a less-hassle environment through monitoring vehicles from the entrance to the exit.

If there are any problems, you can quickly review your reports from monitoring cameras, or any access control software that gathers information to every user of your parking lot. You can then use these reports to resolve any issues regarding users and your parking lot.