Election Outcome: Implications for Transportation and Mobility

The Election Edition

Two weeks ago I read an article that described what difference the main parties would make to parking and mobility if elected.

Interesting but highly irrelevant. As with all the key priorities that require attention: Our Health Service, Poverty, the economy, controlled immigration. The answer should be a clear as day to everyone;

Not a Jot of a difference. Zip, Nada.

Change to our industry will not come from Politics, it won’t come from trade associations or individual companies that are offering disruption rather than a fix. it will come from anyone brave enough to look at the subject and the industry with a clear vision of what is required.

We are ready for an Elon Musk that can ignore what came before, doesn’t care what all the competitors are currently doing, won’t offer a “Me To” solution, but like Tesla, a force that drives change through the industry and sweeps away all of the old rhetoric and thinking. Arguably, the EV infrastructure today would be much poorer if Tesla had not come along.

This country could be great and whilst low on the priority list, can you imagine the huge benefits made to our economy if our transportation, mobility and parking infrastructure looked like this:

Order of priorities

People with restricted mobility

Pedestrians

Cyclists

Public Transportation

Ride share (Only when carrying a fare)

Motorists

Infrastructure

One way arterial last mile routes in and out of tows and cities

Arterial routes configured for Kerbed cycling, Bus and ride share lanes

One lane only for motorised vehicles

Edge of town off street parking with last mile transportation using green carts or public transportation

Towns and Cities

Fully pedestrianised

Only parking on street for Blue Badge holders

High quality and secure bike storage

No HGV or delivery after 09:00

Existing town and city car parks repurposed to living / dwelling space with more parks

In Summary

This is why I say that whoever wins the election tomorrow, none of these changes will be delivered.

No Industry association is within a million miles of making this happen and the industry itself is caught up in trying to nab as much market share as they can.

Change can and will only come from a real paradigm shift to actions and thinking but will inevitably bring a massive improvement to quality of life and create a burgeoning economy.

About the author

Chris has extensive commercial, technical and practical experience in the parking & mobility industry. 

Over the last 20 years has gained an unsurpassed knowledge of the private, public and airport parking transportation and mobility sectors. 

In his most recent role, Chris was the Managing Director of Metric Group UK, the manufacturer of car park payment solutions, with over 900 customers and 18,000 parking solutions UK and worldwide.

He has delivered several consulting projects with extensive work at airports in the APAC region, UK, Europe and USA.

Working with investment funds and potential acquirers he has advised at due diligence and post-acquisition level for investors and C level executives on strategy and implementation.

Prior to consulting, He worked for some of the world’s largest car park operating companies at General Manager level. 

As Head of Parking Services at Royal Borough of Greenwich in London, Chris was responsible for delivering on and off-street parking services in a very diverse London borough.

As Country Manager for an Electric Vehicle (EV) start up business in 2011, he engaged with real estate and parking companies to build an EV infrastructure and was one of the EV pioneers.

As a practitioner he gained a deep understanding of airports whilst Head of Commercial, for parking and ground transportation at both London Gatwick airport (world’s largest airport parking operation) and Melbourne International airport, Australia, the largest parking operation in the Southern hemisphere.

Prior to parking and mobility Chris worked in Retail at W H Smith, Waterstones and Allied Carpets.

Chris holds an International Master of Business Administration qualification that he undertook during full time study at Henley Business School in 2003.