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Geneva – new technology for catching illegally parked cars now active

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The new system for catching cars parking illegally is a specially equipped car that can automatically identify 500 to 1,000 illegally parked cars an hour, compared to 10 by an agent, according to RTS.

© Anna Hristova _ Dreamstime.com

Tested in 2016, the Scan Car swung into operation across the city last week.

A new model of the vehicle will join it in April, according to Geneva’s parking authority. The cars are equipped with cameras connected to a database. The system checks to see if there is a valid parking record in the database matching each car’s license plate.

Scan Cars have four cameras mounted on the roof and can operate at up to 80km/h, capturing license plates with bumpers as close as 20 centimetres apart, says the parking company.

Currently, only 35% of drivers are paying for parks in the city.

Some changes are required to make the system work for all types of parking situations. Resident parking permits will be registered in a central database. Machines will stop issuing paper tickets by the end of February.

Ticket agents will still be required. Scan Cars won’t issue tickets, agents will still do that after being directed to the offending vehicle by the Scan Car.

It is hoped the extra data collected could be used to inform drivers where they can park. According to RTS, 30% of traffic in the city is drivers looking for parks. It is hoped this new technology might help people find empty parks faster. One thing is certain however, it won’t increase the number of parks.

Geneva’s parking company says there are no issues with privacy and data protection – they say the data is deleted. However, given that data is collected and hacks are possible, there can be no guarantee.

More on this:
RTS article (in French) - Take a 5 minute French test now

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Geneva driver faces parking fine of more than 1,800 francs

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Tribune de Genève.

Last Thursday, the driver of a car parked near the intersection of place Bel-Air and rue de la Corraterie received a nasty surprise. The driver, who works in a nearby bank,  left her car parked across tram tracks for 40 minutes, according to Tribune de Genève. This single mistake had a knock-on effect that reverberated through Geneva’s public transport network snarling up traffic flow in the central city.

© Hai Huy Ton That | Dreamstime.com

© Hai Huy Ton That | Dreamstime.com

Fines for interrupting public transport in Geneva are high. Blocking one of the long trams costs CHF 25 per minute, blocking other trams costs CHF 18 per minute, and blocking a  bus costs CHF 8 francs per minute. The VW Touran with Geneva plates, blocked one tram and three buses. According to Tribune de Genève’s back-of-an-envelope calculation the total fine is likely to total a minimum of CHF 1,800.

Interviewed by the newspaper, the driver said: “I’m really sorry…I didn’t realise, I planned to park for a few minutes but then got caught up in what I was doing and forgot. Normally I take public transport. I didn’t notice that I had parked on the rails.”

Incidents like this are rare. In 2016, TPG, Geneva’s public transport operator, recorded only two cases where fines of around CHF 700 were issued. In 2015, TPG sent a bill of CHF 1,630 for a similar incident which blocked the flow of part of public transport network for 35 minutes.

Last week’s incident caused a public transport tailback of nearly 1 km, which ran as far as la place des 22-Cantons, near Cornavin, Geneva’s main train station.

The car was eventually towed at 9:15 am.

More on this:
Tribune de Genève article  (in French)  - Take a 5 minute French test now

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Forget this and you risk getting fined in France

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According to Tribune de Genève, one unlucky Swiss resident was fined in Gaillard in neighbouring France for using the wrong parking disk. They were fined 17 euros, despite not overstaying.

© Syda Productions | Dreamstime.com

© Syda Productions | Dreamstime.com

Swiss rules require drivers to set their arrival time to the nearest half hour after their arrival. Someone arriving at 8:36 should set their disk at 9:00.

Swiss parking rules are covered by Article 48 of the highway rules. Disks must have half hour increments, and look like the image below.

Swiss parking disk

Swiss parking disk

The problem is, French disks have ten minute increments, like the one shown in the following photograph.

French parking disk

French parking disk

Half hour increments are more generous to drivers. If you arrive at 8:36, then on a Swiss disk, your time starts at 9:00. On a French disk your time would start at 8:40. Setting the start time to 9:00 in this instance, breaks French rules.

While the Tribune de Genève suggests the French disk is standard across european countries beyond Switzerland, a quick online search in German and Italian suggests their disks are the same as the Swiss ones, French disks being the odd one out.

The hapless driver found the 17 euro ticket under the windscreen wiper. The car was parked only 100m from the Swiss border.

It’s not clear what should befall those who use French disks in Switzerland. You could hardly fine someone for being more precise could you? Surely that would just be splitting hairs.

More on this:
Read full Tribune de Genève article (in French) - Take a 5 minute French test now

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Geneva’s fines for excessive noise and driving in bus lanes more than triple

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Tribune de Genève.

On 1 October 2015, fines in Geneva went up massively. According to Tribune Genéve, the increases are expected to put an extra CHF 3 to 4 million per year into Geneva’s public purse.

The increases impact a myriad of things including driving and parking infringements and excessive noise. For example the fine for driving in a bus lane increased from CHF 60 to CHF 200, and the maximum fine for excessive noise in an apartment went from CHF 100 to an eye-watering CHF 1,000.

Noise fines Switzerland

The average increase across all offenses is 20%. Canton representatives said that this 20% increase since 1996 is not much above inflation, which was 13% over the same period. The excess was justified by not wanting to have to make changes every year – in effect adjusting for inflation in advance.

Last year Geneva issued a total of around a million fines. Noise control responded to 6,000 complaints. Fines for excessive noise will rise from CHF 100 or CHF 150, depending on the type of noise, to CHF 1,000. If you organise a loud dance party in your apartment and several people call the police the fine is now CHF 300. If you wake up everyone in your building then the fine rises to CHF 1,000. A lot more than the old maximum of CHF 150.

Fines set at a federal level are not affected. These include most speeding offenses and infringements covered by federal driving laws known as Via Sicura.

Read full Tribune de Genève article here.

What do you think of this move? Will it improve the lives of Geneva residents or just make them poorer?

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