University of Twente optimizes campus parking with Nedap and Vialis

To optimize the traffic flow, the University of Twente has recently equipped its campus with a new parking management system. With the installation of Nedap’s SENSIT wireless parking sensors and  Vialis’ Vivaldi traffic management system, the “UTwente” becomes the world’s first University with a combined system for real-time parking detection and parking guidance.

University of Twente

Located in Enschede, the University of Twente is one of the largest and most technology advanced universities in the East of the Netherlands. The University was the first in the Netherlands to introduce a US-like campus, with housing, sport facilities and shops. With over 12.000 students, researchers and professionals visiting the University on a daily base, traffic has to be managed efficiently to avoid congestion, and students and professors from running late for class and meetings.

Improving the parking experience

In a first attempt to optimize the parking experience at the campus area, the university equipped the parking areas with loop detection systems to detect vehicle presence. However, due to the wide lanes and cyclists who were also being detected, the system did not provide the error free and accurate data needed to assist motorists. By integrating Nedap’s SENSIT sensors with Vialis’ Vivaldi system for parking guidance, the university has found a solid solution to optimize the parking management at the schools’ campus.

Nedap’s SENSIT system consists of wireless parking sensors that detect in real-time whether or not a single parking bay is occupied and how long it has been occupied. This information is used to guide students, employees and visitors to available parking spaces, decreasing the amount of search traffic, thus reducing the pollution on the campus. Additionally, parking utilization at the location is optimized and the overall parking experience is improved.

Parking guidance

Parking guidance signs, placed at several locations around the campus, provide the real-time occupancy status of the parking areas equipped with SENSIT on-street parking sensors. With these insights, motorist at the campus are now efficiently guided to the available parking bays.

The new flexible parking management system enables the University of Twente to further enhance its parking and traffic facilities in the future. The sensors and parking guidance signs create powerful tools to assist drivers in the most efficient way at peak traffic hours during activities and events around the university’s location.

Optimizing campus parking worldwide

Like the University of Twente, many university’s worldwide are coping with parking issues related to  large amounts of traffic at class and work peaks times. Often, existing parking spaces are underutilized since they are not visible to motorists. Due to the high amount of parking search traffic, the traffic flow around the universities is stagnating, leading to congestion, students running late for classes and others running late for work. Intelligent on-street parking sensors, like Nedap’s SENSIT, can help to obtain the real-time parking data needed to efficiently guide motorist to available parking spaces and optimize campus parking.