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EasyPark has a service history of over 50 years in parking management and excellence within the City of Vancouver. Yes, parking has been an 'issue’ for a long time and Vancouver has faced traffic congestion from as early as 1950. What with the end of the war, plus growth in housing development and industry, the city quickly began to show signs of becoming a major west coast metropolis.
Downtown property owners, merchants and business executives soon joined together to address the increasing problem of parking space. They proposed the establishment of a special assessment district consisting of about half a square mile of the downtown quarter. The City raised the necessary money, providing it was committed to the purchase of surface parking lots, by issuing debentures subscribed to by the general public. The lots were then managed using the money raised. And there a developing parking system was born.
Since then, the Parking Corporation of Vancouver/EasyPark, as it now exists, is jointly owned by the City and the Downtown Vancouver Association (DVA). This share structure gives the City sole title to the assets of, and the revenues generated by, the Corporation; while the DVA provides the business expertise to conduct the affairs of the Corporation. It is governed by a board of two appointed and twelve elected directors.
An organization that started life as the brainchild of a small group of downtown business owners has grown to be an organization that ranks among very best of North American parking facility managers. It has done so by sticking to the principles of its founders: to provide safe, clean parking for downtown shoppers at a fair price.
Of course, there has been a certain amount of evolution in company philosophy since the early days. Apart from the need to be self-sustaining, the Corporation needs to fund development of the Vancouver off-street parking program whilst remaining committed to providing a healthy financial return to the City of Vancouver. Part of the Corporation's responsibility is to assist the City's monitoring of parking demands and to recommend expansion to cover parking shortfalls in unserviced areas. The Corporation also takes an entrepreneurial point of view when recommending joint ventures with public and private agencies, particularly through participation in appropriate public and private sector development discussions.
Where do your parking fees go now? All net revenues go to the respective owners of the parking facilities (which is the City of Vancouver in the majority of cases), for reinvestment in the development of public parking facilities. Easypark facilities are intended to act as an integral component of Vancouver's transportation infrastructure and their use should be complementary to the vitality of the downtown business community.
EasyPark presently manages 38 facilities, totaling over 9,300 parking spaces and ranging in size from 20 to 1,577 spaces. We manage premier parkades within the city, including Pacific Centre, Pacific Centre North, Gastown, Library Square, YWCA & Yaletown.
On such a grand scale, efficiency is vital. We therefore use leading-edge technology for pay & display (P&D), pay-on-exit or cashier (POE) and pay-on-foot (POF) transient parking configurations. The parkade at Pacific Centre is constantly used as an example of the latest in POF technology and the use of RF transponder technology to provide the most convenient 'hands free’ automated access for the 800 monthly patrons on site.
EasyPark has become a customer-oriented, service-driven organization. We recognized the need to train our staff at all levels to communicate effectively, to handle customer concerns, to build staff morale, to work together as a team and to understand the importance of effective customer service in generating repeat business. Our business alliance with the Pacific Rim Institute of Tourism has provided a customer service training program built on their very successful SuperHost and Team Excellence sessions.
Visit our RestEasy section to find out more about how we help our customers.
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