Sticking paper slips on your dashboard after paying for parking may soon be a thing of the past.
The Saint John Parking Commission is upgrading its pay-and-display units to a new paperless system called “pay by plate”.
CEO Ian MacKinnon tells us it’s part of their plan to do away with the remaining coin-operated meters.
“What you’ll do now is you’ll leave your car, you’ll walk to the unit and you’ll punch in your plate number, and that will be it,” says MacKinnon.
MacKinnon says enforcement officers will use a hand-held device to scan your licence plate and see how much time is left.
He says they spend upwards of $35,000 a year on paper tickets so one of their goals is to reduce that amount.
The new machines will be placed in high-traffic areas, starting at St. Joseph’s Hospital, and the pay-and-display units will be moved to lower-traffic areas.
“What will fall out the bottom is the traditional coin-operated type meters, eventually what you’ll see is they’ll disappear,” says MacKinnon, adding that paying by cash will always be an option.
Council recently approved the purchase of 11 meters and MacKinnon says they’ll be replacing the old units over the next few years.
