Solar-powered ticket vending machines with multiple payment options will soon greet motorists in the parliamentary triangle.
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The National Capital Authority revealed on Monday its plans for the sun to power its venture into pay parking for 7000 spaces in the precinct.
Some details of the ‘‘pay and display’’ machines are contained in the tender which is being released on Monday.
The NCA will buy 190 machines and the ACT Government will buy 300, for off-street parking.
The combined tender calls for bids to supply, install, commission and maintain up with 490 pay parking ticket machines with multiple payment options.
As reported on Saturday, Canberra motorists will soon be able to forget carrying coins for parking in government car parks.
The state-of-the art parking machines will be capable of taking credit cards and may be able to accept payment by MyWay cards and smartphones.
Pay parking is being introduced to four inner Canberra precincts – the Parliamentary Triangle, Barton, Russell and Acton – to free up parking spaces at cultural institutions for visitors.
Parking in the area will cost the average full-time worker $2640 a year from July.
Some of the new machines being purchased by the National Capital Authority will be coin operated, for the benefit of visitors.
Parliament House and the four independent institutions that run their own car parks – the National Gallery, National Portrait Gallery, High Court and War Memorial – face a dilemma: impose paid parking or a voucher system on staff and volunteers or risk having free car parks swamped by public servants.
The Australian War Memorial will install barriers and boom gates to keep out commuters who park there and ride or walk to Civic. Veterans, tourists and staff will be given vouchers for free parking.
One option is a version of the honesty-based voucher system at the National Portrait Gallery.
The Auditor-General reported midyear that Canberra’s paid parking machines were faulty and outdated and were losing at least $1million a year.
The ACT government was expected to call bids in the middle of the year to replace 300 off-street parking machines but delayed the project when paid parking for the national land in central Canberra was unveiled in the federal budget.
On-street pay parking machines will be considered at a later date.
The decision by the government and NCA to combine for a tender should reduce the cost through economies of scale.
The tender will close on October 23 and it is expected the new machines will be installed early next year.
