the “Lapi” automatic parking control has doubled the fines
The results of the first month of commissioning of automated parking ticketing in Toulouse, via the Lapi system, have fallen: for the month of September 2022 alone, the number of fines was multiplied by 2.5 compared to the average. monthly in 2021. An effective measure therefore for the Town Hall, but which still raises some concerns in the opposition.
35,000 fines for non-payment of parking in the streets of the Pink City were sent for the month of September 2022 alone. This figure, communicated by the Town Hall to Mediacitiesis actually that of the post-parking packages (FPS) issued by the new automatic control system Lapi, set up in Toulouse. Since August 16, this has been ensured thanks to two dedicated vehicles that criss-cross the city, with a license plate reading device on board. Thus, any owner of a vehicle that is not referenced in the databases of the town hall as having an exemption (persons with reduced mobility, resident or professional subscriptions) and who has not paid for his parking via a parking meter or the Park Now app, is automatically verbalized.
First assessment of the Lapi automatic parking control in Toulouse
These are so more than 90,000 vehicles, parked in the 16,300 paying spaces on the streets of Toulouse, which have been checked in September by the two unmarked cars of the town hall. A third of them were verbalized by the Lapi system because their owner had not gone through the parking meter (35,000). At 30 euros the initial FPS, this represents a monthly revenue of more than one million euros for the municipality. Gain who has more than doubled since the implementation of the automatic control system. Indeed, according to an annual report communicated by the town hall of Toulouse, 161,562 post-parking passes were issued in 2021, i.e. an average of 13,463 per month. Compared to the 35,000 issued during the month of September 2022 alone, the increase is therefore significant. Superior even to the first estimates and expectations of the City.
However, these figures should be qualified since administrative appeals are regularly filed by fined motorists who dispute their FPS. In 2021, the Town Hall received 5,950 mandatory prior administrative appeals (Rapo), an average of nearly 500 per month. This is twice less than those of September 2022 alone, with the Lapi device. 1,221 Rapos were filed in 30 days last month. A logical increase in litigation in view of the doubling of the number of verbalizations. Moreover, proportionally, appeals remain stable: 3.7% per month on average in 2021, compared to 3.4% in September 2022.
The Rapos in question
Disputes by Rapo, which do not fail to arouse the mistrust of the municipal opposition. Indeed, during the last municipal council which took place on November 9, 2022, Aymeric Deheurles of the group Alternative Municipaliste Citoyenne (AMC) wondered in particular about the fairness of the controls. Emilion Esnault, deputy mayor in charge of security and the municipal police, assures him: ” We are able to control all of Toulouse’s 16,000 paid parking spaces once a day. Which doesn’t mean it’s actually done. So to ensure that “everyone is well housed in the same boat”, the elected opposition member asked for the communication, a posteriori, of the routes of the Lapi cars in order to check that all neighborhoods are fairly controlled. A request that found no response.
The processing of requests for cancellation of fines is also in the sights of Aymeric Deheurles, who returns to an incident in front of the Jesuit private school Le Caousou, located in the Guilhemery district of Toulouse. There, parents who came to drop off their children got into the habit of parking in double line, on a bus lane. “They were fined and the town hall advised them to challenge by Rapo “Relates the elected, who asks to know what has become of the litigation, “knowing that this is not a default of payment, but illegal parking …”, he recalls. This does not suit Emilion Esnault. The assistant therefore explains that in this case, “ no Rapo is possible. Parking in a bus lane is considered inconvenient parking by the Highway Code. This was noted by an ASVP agent and not by the Lapi, who reported payment defaults to this same school.
ASVP recruitment in progress
ASVP agents who were also mentioned during this municipal council meeting on November 9th. Odile Maurin, elected opposition member and member of the AMC group, who had already agitated the difficulties for people with reduced mobility to fit into the systemchallenges the majority as to the working conditions of municipal officials. ” Their the workforce has fallen from 67 in 2017 to around twenty people today,” she says. The elected representative compares the situation with that of Lyon, which has 90 ASVPs: “There, an agent checks 477 parking spaces, while in Toulouse everyone must check every 815,” she notes. requiring human resources to carry out control missions parking.
Intervention of @odile31 who wonders about the working conditions of the ASVP:
👉 Not being well at work due to management issues
👉 Reduction of staff, for goals that remain very high: 1 agent must control more than 800 places. #CMToulouse pic.twitter.com/kgl4n4tMRt— AMC Group 🦜 (@GroupeAMC) November 9, 2022
For Emilion Esnault, this comparison is inappropriate since Toulouse now has the Lapi system unlike Lyon. “It allows you to control more places. Automation means less need for agents “explains the deputy mayor. However, it specifies that recruitments are in progress to revert to ASVP quarantine as originally planned. In particular, they will have the task ofintensify “the removal of doubt”, that is to say the physical observation of proof of exemption from parking payment such as the presence of cards issued to people with disabilities (CMIS) on the windshield, after a Lapi report. This allows people with reduced mobility not to be automatically fined and then have to contest their ticket. “It is still regularly the case”, observes Odile Maurin, who announces thatit will seize the administrative court on this subject.