Paid parking in Toulouse: the lethal weapon
From this Tuesday, August 16, parking will again be paid for in the streets of Toulouse. With a great novelty: the arrival of on-board cameras to control payment.
New turn of the screw for Toulouse motorists. Already on January 1, 2018, the PV at €17 for all those who forgot to go to the parking meter had been almost doubled as part of a national reform to reach €30 in the Pink City in the event of non-payment or overrun. of the schedule. The number of agents in charge of parking control, insufficient according to the regional chamber of accounts, had also been increased in those years.
This Tuesday, August 16, on the occasion of the return of paid parking after the usual parenthesis of free parking for the first fortnight of the month, marks a new stage with the arrival of “flashing” cars, i.e. equipped cameras that activated the offense much faster than officers on foot. Other major cities in France have gone there: Paris, Bordeaux, Marseille, Lille, Montpellier, Nice… The Pink City, after having confirmed and announced it for several years already, is getting started in turn.
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For the Toulousain, it’s a revolution. Car paying for street parking in town remains an exception. In 2019, the town hall had obtained that only 30% of motorists fulfilled this obligation. Fraud, according to this indicator which has not been updated since, therefore remains largely in the majority: seven motorists out of ten do not pay. And therefore think today more than yesterday of being verbalized.
controller more
During the municipal council which saw the adoption of the system, on October 22, the deputy mayor in charge of security, Emilion Esnault insisted on a “gradual” arrival of on-board cameras. “I don’t set a target rate,” he said. For the elected official, “it is not a question of bludgeoning but of enforcing the parking lot”. But it is obvious that with such a system, the rate of control of the 16,600 paying places will increase. Today, the whole park cannot be checked in one day.
Control more, it is besides the goal because Toulouse like all the large cities cannot accomodate all the cars which would like to come there. This is why in 2007, the first parking meters appeared with a residential parking system, that is to say paying but at a preferential rate for local residents. “We must regulate so that everyone finds a place by allowing a rotation of vehicles”, recalls Maxime Boyer, deputy mayor in charge of parking. The goal is also “to better share public space in favor of pedestrians and cyclists”, a desire which is more recent than the arrival of parking meters. But which also explains the disappearance of parking spaces, as will be the case with the cycle path on rue Valade, between place Saint-Pierre and Saint-Sernin, or on the axes of the future Réseau express vélo. In town, the car still gives up a bit of ground.
45 paying districts
Set up in 2007 in Toulouse, resident parking, that is to say paying for all and at preferential rates for local residents, has continued to expand. In June 2021, the Saint-Agne-Crampel sector went there. In April 2022, the Récollets adopted him. It is the last district, and therefore 45th, to become paying. Consultations have recently been received with a view to extensions by the end of the year. This concerns, for example, a few streets in Le Busca around rue Déodora, the sector of rue du Midi, place Arago (in Bonnefoy), or even avenue du Grande-Bretagne and Barrière-de-Bayonne which could pass in retail parking. “There is always a phase of consultation to restore the agreement of the inhabitants”, notes Maxime Boyer. In some places, such as Les Amidonniers or Héraklès, the majority of opinions have so far remained reserved.