Parking Reform Atlas
Tel Aviv mobile-only on-street parking payments
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Brief summary of this reform
In Tel Aviv the only options to pay for casual on-street parking are pay-by-phone (two companies) or by in-vehicle meter (one company).
This mobile-only approach replaced the older system of paying by displaying pre-purchased paper coupons. Tel Aviv has not used parking meters for on-street parking payments since 1972.
Why should you care?
This is a case of a large city where casual on-street parking payments are handled ONLY by mobile payment options, with no parking meter option. It shares this distinction with several other cities, including other cities in Israel and São Paulo and Shenzhen.
This experience should encourage cities that do not currently use parking meters, but which want in adopt or expand paid on-street parking, to consider avoiding parking meters completely and to jump straight to mobile-only payment systems.
Country
Israel
Vehicle type
cars
State/province
Key actor type
Local government
Jurisdiction
Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality
Primary motivation
other
Agencies involved
Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality and several private-sector mobile payments providers
Is it a model or a warning?
useful model
Reform type
Main parking category
Main parking paradigm shift
pricing
On-street (many contexts)
Helpful for park-once-and-walk approach
Adaptive Parking thrust
Implementation status
Year adopted
P: Price parking in the right ways and with the right rates for each place and time
implemented
Goals of the reform
I have not yet found information on goals of the switch from card (coupon) payments to mobile payments. But see impetus below for
Impetus (what problem, campaign, opportunity or event prompted action?)
The shift from pre-purchased card or coupon-based parking payments to digital mobile payments has several advantaged, such as a data stream, the ability to extend parking sessions, and much more efficient enforcement with less cheating. These benefits must have motivated the switch when mobile payments technology became reliable enough.
One impetus to accelerate the phase-out of paper parking payment cards may have been the discovery in late 2007 of a factory producing fake parking cards (according to a 2008 Jerusalem Post report).
Detailed description of the reform
Tel Aviv does not use in-street parking meters or parking payment stations. The only methods for paying for casual on-street parking are mobile methods (via smartphone or via in-vehicle parking meter).
According to the Tel Aviv-Yafo government, the payment options for on-street parking (marked in blue and white, with paid parking from Sundays to Thursdays, 09:00am to 7:00pm and Fridays and holidays, 09:00am to 1:00pm) are as follows:
* Cellopark - Payment via cellular phone.
* Pango- payment via cellular phones.
* Easypark payment via "an electronic smart card" (which, from the website, is clearly an in-vehicle parking meter solution). [See image above. Image credit: http://www.easypark.co.il/ ]
Another option, Achuzatot Ha’hof, apparently applies only to Municipality Parking Lots
https://www.tel-aviv.gov.il/en/Live/Transportation/Pages/Parkingpaymentoptions.aspx
This mobile-only approach replaced the older system of paying by displaying pre-purchased paper coupons. It is not clear to me exactly when this shift happened. There must have been a period in which both paper parking cards and the in-vehicle meter and mobile-phone based payment options coexisted.
According to Azhar Ghani (2011) : Tel Aviv did adopt parking meters for on-street parking payments in 1965 but replaced them with a 'card' (or coupon) system in 1972. This was considered successful and was emulated by Haifa, Jerusalem and by Singapore.
At some point in recent years, Tel Aviv phased out the card or coupon approach and switched to the digital mobile-only approaches seen today.
Results or impacts
More information is needed here. Can anyone suggest sources?
According to Assaf Rubinstein (2015), "... in 2007 revenues from street parking in Tel-Aviv were $16 million. In 2010, with over 30% of drivers using a parking application, revenues rose to $30 million." This makes me wonder if the shift from cards (coupons) began between 2007 and 2010.
Sources and acknowledgements
"Parking Payment Options", Tel Aviv - Yafo Municipality, https://www.tel-aviv.gov.il/en/Live/Transportation/Pages/Parkingpaymentoptions.aspx
"Parking in Tel Aviv" https://www.touristisrael.com/parking-in-tel-aviv/33103/
Assaf Rubinstein, Mar 07, 2015, "Pango - Bringing the future of street parking by making parking meters a thing of the past", https://www.hbs.edu/openforum/openforum.hbs.org/goto/challenge/understand-digital-transformation-of-business/pango-bringing-the-future-of-street-parking-by-making-parking-meters-a-thing-of-the-past/comments/c-0b9e57c46de934cee33b0e8d1839bfc2.html
Azhar Ghani, March 2011, "Success Matters: the Parking Coupon System", IPS Update, https://lkyspp.nus.edu.sg/docs/default-source/ips/azhar_the-parking-coupon-system_010311.pdf
URAIA Case Study "Pango parking payment system of the Union of Local Authorities of Israel (ULAI) and the Local Government Economic Services Company - Israel" https://www.uraia.org/documents/43/1811_arquivoB.pdf
Miriam Bulwar David-Hay, "Drivers warned about fake parking cards -
Private detectives discovered a factory in Tel Aviv that was manufacturing fake cards at a high standard." Jerusalem Post, 13 Jan. 2008. https://www.jpost.com/local-israel/tel-aviv-and-center/drivers-warned-about-fake-parking-cards
Last updated:
24 Mar 2021