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ASPEN — Paying to park in downtown Aspen will now be a phone call away.
Hundreds of people who use in-car meters to pay to park will now have to use a pay-by-phone system, a method that was signed off by the Aspen City Council on Monday.
Since 1995, more than 30,000 in-car meters have been distributed. The programmed devices are leased by individuals who pre-pay for parking time. Users turn the unit on and hang it from their rear-view mirror as an alternative to physically paying at the on-street pay stations.
But the devices are no longer being manufactured, so a new system will take their place. The system involves a live, Web-based call center in Canada, where first-time users would either call in or go online to set up an account.
A 10-second phone call by users will initiate a parking session that can last up to four hours, the maximum amount of time offered throughout the commercial core, parking officials say. If a user returns to the vehicle before the parking session expires, he or she can terminate it by making another phone call.
There will be, however, a 35-cent “convenience” fee for each parking transaction, which will be paid to Verrus Mobile Technologies, the Vancouver-based company providing the system.
The other catch is that if users pay for four hours, they have to wait 30 minutes before they can start another parking session. That’s to prevent someone from renewing an hour at a time to pay a lower fee.
Any renewal of an existing parking session will follow the same fee structure that the on-street meters use — $2 for the first hour, $2 for the second hour, $3 for the third hour and $4 for the fourth hour.
The pay-by-phone option also will be available in the residential permit parking zones, where motorists starting in February will be charged $7 a day to park. Pay stations in neighborhoods three blocks off the downtown core already have been installed.
Enforcement officers will have smart phones so that they can log onto a database and see in real time the license plates of all current parking sessions to determine whether a parking fee was paid for a vehicle.
Transactions will be done using a credit card put on file, and users can access their accounts to review their parking transactions. All calls to the call center — whether they are correct, incorrect or incomplete — will be documented in order to help resolve any payment disputes that may arise.
Costs to the city government to change systems is $9,000 — $3,000 for informational signs and $9,000 for software development.
Parking director Tim Ware said his department will “start out soft” on informational signs directing motorists how to use the new system because it’s expensive and is only one payment option. And it certainly won’t be as much as what Verrus Mobile Technologies has suggested, which is partially driven by the transaction fee.
“Obviously the more people [that use pay by phone], the happier they are,” Ware said.
The in-car meter program was budgeted to bring in $840,000 in revenue in 2009. It’s not certain that all the in-car meters users will convert to the pay-by-phone system, but if a user elects not to use it, the on-street pay station is still an option. Therefore, parking officials aren’t projecting any major increases or decreases in revenue.
Since 2001, the pay-by-phone systems offered by Verrus Mobile Technologies have become available in more than 90 communities throughout North America and Europe, making it the most widely used pay-by-phone system.
csack@aspentimes.com
Hundreds of people who use in-car meters to pay to park will now have to use a pay-by-phone system, a method that was signed off by the Aspen City Council on Monday.
Since 1995, more than 30,000 in-car meters have been distributed. The programmed devices are leased by individuals who pre-pay for parking time. Users turn the unit on and hang it from their rear-view mirror as an alternative to physically paying at the on-street pay stations.
But the devices are no longer being manufactured, so a new system will take their place. The system involves a live, Web-based call center in Canada, where first-time users would either call in or go online to set up an account.
A 10-second phone call by users will initiate a parking session that can last up to four hours, the maximum amount of time offered throughout the commercial core, parking officials say. If a user returns to the vehicle before the parking session expires, he or she can terminate it by making another phone call.
There will be, however, a 35-cent “convenience” fee for each parking transaction, which will be paid to Verrus Mobile Technologies, the Vancouver-based company providing the system.
The other catch is that if users pay for four hours, they have to wait 30 minutes before they can start another parking session. That’s to prevent someone from renewing an hour at a time to pay a lower fee.
Any renewal of an existing parking session will follow the same fee structure that the on-street meters use — $2 for the first hour, $2 for the second hour, $3 for the third hour and $4 for the fourth hour.
The pay-by-phone option also will be available in the residential permit parking zones, where motorists starting in February will be charged $7 a day to park. Pay stations in neighborhoods three blocks off the downtown core already have been installed.
Enforcement officers will have smart phones so that they can log onto a database and see in real time the license plates of all current parking sessions to determine whether a parking fee was paid for a vehicle.
Transactions will be done using a credit card put on file, and users can access their accounts to review their parking transactions. All calls to the call center — whether they are correct, incorrect or incomplete — will be documented in order to help resolve any payment disputes that may arise.
Costs to the city government to change systems is $9,000 — $3,000 for informational signs and $9,000 for software development.
Parking director Tim Ware said his department will “start out soft” on informational signs directing motorists how to use the new system because it’s expensive and is only one payment option. And it certainly won’t be as much as what Verrus Mobile Technologies has suggested, which is partially driven by the transaction fee.
“Obviously the more people [that use pay by phone], the happier they are,” Ware said.
The in-car meter program was budgeted to bring in $840,000 in revenue in 2009. It’s not certain that all the in-car meters users will convert to the pay-by-phone system, but if a user elects not to use it, the on-street pay station is still an option. Therefore, parking officials aren’t projecting any major increases or decreases in revenue.
Since 2001, the pay-by-phone systems offered by Verrus Mobile Technologies have become available in more than 90 communities throughout North America and Europe, making it the most widely used pay-by-phone system.
csack@aspentimes.com
