This month, the City of Boulder Community Vitality Department is replacing older parking pay stations around Boulder with new, more efficient and customer-friendly pay stations and installations have already begun this week. The new pay stations offer a “pay by license plate” parking system, offering customers an enhanced user experience, while helping the city reduce its carbon footprint.
The city’s current “pay and display” parking stations were installed in 2008, and at that time, the system served the city’s customer-focused goals and featured the latest technology. In 2019, the city released a request for proposals in search of a qualified vendor to implement parking technology in line with current trends in the parking industry. Flowbird was selected to supply 134 new smart parking kiosks and is the manufacturer of the newer pay stations in/around Chautauqua Park and in the Civic Area.
The new parking pay stations are designed to make the parking process faster and simpler, while also meeting city sustainability goals. Drivers enter their license plate numbers into the new easy-to-use pay stations and complete their transaction. There is no need to walk back to the vehicle and place a paper receipt on the dashboard (and no paper waste either). The pay stations are solar-powered. License plate recognition (LPR) technology is used for parking management and enforcement, which is more efficient and increases parking turnover and access to on-street parking spaces.
The new touch-screen pay by plate pay stations accept payment in coin, credit or debit card (including Downtown Boulder Partnership gift cards), with a 9.7” full-color touch display that is accessible for all by Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) standards. The touch screen display walks users through the transaction process.
Boulder joins many other cities across the United States in transitioning from pay and display to pay by plate parking including Austin, Chicago, Miami, Oklahoma City, Philadelphia, and Portland. Flowbird parking kiosks are in over 5,000 cities around the globe, and are in several locations around Colorado, including Aspen, Breckenridge, Telluride, Colorado State University, and at 26 Colorado State Parks.
More information: visit BoulderParking.com or call 303-413-7300.