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Case study | Parksol counting system with TOF sensors, Norway

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Year Project size Location Products installed
2021 335 parking spaces Norway, Trondheim TOF sensors for counting
Counting controller
LED displays
Server with management software and API REST protocol

 

Parksol counting system with TOF sensors: Situation

Pirbadet – which appears in the transition between sea and land – is in Norway’s largest indoor water park and is located on the waterfront in Trondheim. The spectacular venue houses both swimming and fitness activities, which combine to attract around half a million visits annually.

Such a popular place attracts a lot of visitors who come by car, it is about 500 parking transactions a day. Imagine that it’s quite heavy traffic in the underground parking. The issue was that the visitors, were coming to a waterpark and they could not see any information outside about free parking space, so they had to drive in and search for it. The idea for this project was to install the TOF sensors system for Pirbadet underground parking.

There are 335 parking spaces. It was necessary to have a solution to count the cars and show real-time availability of free parking spaces in outdoor LED display and also on the Pirbadet website.

    

Goals

The goals of the project were to provide correct information on parking occupancy in advance and help guests to pick a less crowded time for a water park visit. Furthermore, the main reason for installation was to ease finding free parking space when visitors arrive there. Finally, it was a great way to send reports to water park employees: occupancy, parking time, peak hours in the parking, so they can manage their business.

Challenges

There is no project without a challenge. The first challenge was to implement the park owner’s desire to have a map of all facilities on the website where he could see the occupancy of the parking space in real-time. This was resolved with the implementation of the REST API protocol, which is used for external applications (third party system, payment system, variable message LED sign, APP, etc.).

The second part of the challenge was to implement a solution in existing facilities, therefore there was no permission for ground digging for loop installation so we have installed TOF counters.

Solution

Despite all challenges in Pirbadet water park underground garage was installed Time-of-flight Car Counting system which consists of two double-head TOF sensors for counting with RGB indication, 1 LED signage at the entrance, counting controller, server, and monitoring software.

The TOF sensors were mounted above the entrance/exit. When the car enters/leaves TOF sensor detects the car, gives a signal to the counting controller, and the parking number of free spaces changes in the LED signage. Then the driver can clearly see the occupancy of the parking on the water park website too. The server is collecting data for analytics.

A counting system with TOF sensors is an alternative for counting solutions with loops because no need to dig the pavement or damage any infrastructure under the pavement. Installation is simpler and faster. TOF sensors have an IP66 ingress protection class, which guarantees a long lifetime.

Project success brought great value for waterpark: now visitors can easily see the available parking space before driving to the underground car park. From now park owners can track traffic, parking time, occupancy, and all that information can be used for detailed analysis. The scenario module is processing generated events from Parksol by using logic elements to activate recognized situations.

Additional system features:

  • Parking space occupancy on the website page (easy for customers to see before coming to the waterpark).
  • Easy navigation in the parking lot (LED signage shows how many parking spaces are free. This signage is installed by the entrance that drivers could see if there are available free spaces or not).
  • Statistics, reports, analysis.

Statistics/impact on business

  • Information in advance: Drivers see the number of available parking spaces at the entrance.
  • Analytics: Report module shows circulation, parking time, occupancy with export to standard files for detailed analysis. The scenario module is processing generated events from Parksol by using logic elements to activate recognized situations.
  • Better user experience: a positive impression about the Pirbadet water park.

Familiar projects: We sold and implemented the same system in two German supermarkets, as well as in Estonia.

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