If you live in Sydney, one thing you’re all too familiar with (between bin chickens and absurd rental prices) is the parking situation. Up and down streets, it’s so hard to find a park in this dang city – that was (hopefully) until now, with the arrival of Park’nPay.
Park’nPay is the new app launched by the NSW government, with the intention to cut down on parking stress in the big city.
The app is a collaboration between the NSW government, Parkhound (a private parking aggregation app) and Chargefox (Australia’s largest EV network). With these three forces combined, this app could shape up to be quite useful while it’s still being rolled out.
What is Park’nPay?
Put simply, Park’nPay allows you to find available metered parking through an app, pay for your parking once you’ve parked (without needing to go to the machine) and top-up your meter while you’re out and about, taking away the need to return to your car to pay for more hours. Parking is an absolute mess in densely populated areas, so hopefully this can help out with things.
There’s no subscription service, just the need to pay for the parking spot you’re using.
“This will significantly ease parking congestion and save drivers from circling the block searching for a space,” says Michael Rosenbaum, the chief executive officer of Parkhound.
While Park’nPay doesn’t have a live feed of every available park in the state right now, it’s still a handy thing to have when looking for a park in the big smoke.
That being said, parking spots listed on the app have colour indicators that tell you when the busier periods are and when you’re less likely to get a park. The app also maps out Chargefox EV charging stations, loading zones, 2P and 4P zones.
One of the cooler features of the app is that it also displays parks put on lease by private car spot owners (yes, you can lease out your car spot through an app) through Parkhound, which has been available for a while now. Glancing over greater Sydney, daily prices for a park range pretty widely between $10 and $62 depending on the location and the spot itself.
“Now with just a tap of their phone, motorists can easily find and rent a privately owned car park or search for a charging station convenient to them,” says Victor Dominello, the Minister for Digital and Customer Service. “This is a smart solution for a smart state.”
It’s still early days for the app, and although it’s only displaying parking information in select locations across the state (the available locations are listed in the app) it’s a pretty good idea that I can see a lot of use out of, especially if you’re frequenting shopping centres and city parking. Just don’t pay for your parking before you’ve parked – you can still get swooped!
Park’nPay is available on the Apple App Store and on the Google Play store. There’s an app for everything.