The Wiki Man

17 May 2008

Rory Sutherland's fortnightly column on technology and the web

What has parking to do with technology? Just wait and see. Payment by mobile phone (a concept pioneered by companies such as Verrus.com and RingGo and common in Westminster) will be revolutionary. It allows anyone efficiently to charge for parking without the expense of running meters or ticket machines. Better still, it makes it possible to vary pricing, with an easyJet-style approach to balancing supply and demand. (Shoup recommends prices flex to keep 10 to 15 per cent of parking bays vacant at any time.) It can even tell drivers where parking is available.

Together with pay-as-you-drive insurance plans (a Norwich Union idea described at www.snipurl.com/paydrive) and schemes such as www.streetcar.co.uk, this illustrates that technology can transform the efficiency of car-use, meaning the price of using a car will become better aligned with its social costs.

The greatest benefit may come from GPS. Not only in cutting atmospheric pollution (by routing people around congestion) but visual pollution too. By 2018, with GPS in all cars, we can get rid of all modern metal road signs, restoring British towns and countryside to a tasteful, Betjemanesque state. I am, so far, the only person to propose this. Perhaps it’s one for Mr MacKenzie’s next manifesto?

Rory Sutherland is vice-chairman of Ogilvy Group UK.

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Rory Williams

May 18th, 2008 12:47am Report this comment

You may be interested to read about one Hans Monderman (http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,448747,00.html), a civil engineer from the Netherlands, who has also suggested removing all traffic signs. A few places have even tried it. His motivation is not so much aesthetic as practical: he believes that drivers will drive more safely if they are given full responsibility for their decisions, instead of relying on engineers to tell them what to do. Efficient social self-regulation.

I have also just written a post on the parking theme, with some thoughts on how the recently developed concept of "New Mobility" might improve the efficiency of how we use cars and transport infrastructure. (http://www.carbonsmart.com/carboncopy/2008/05/paving-paradise.html)

Rory Sutherland

May 21st, 2008 12:32am Report this comment

I have read a little about Monderman: from what I hear the removal of signs causes people to drive with far greater consideration and courtesy than before.

It has always struck me as odd that the free-market US is so disdainful of roundabouts (which are a self-regulating solution) preferring the far more dirigiste, interventionist traffic light.

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