Parking lots are often overlooked spaces. However, a well-designed parking lot can have a big impact on your company — certain features could reduce employee/visitor stress, improve security or help promote sustainable travel. For inspiration, below are just 7 ways you could potentially revamp your company car park.
By Team Savant
Image: Kevin Schmid
Incorporate Landscaping And Greenery
The appearance of a parking lot can impact how inviting it is. Adding some trees and grass around walkways is one way to make your parking lot more attractive. Growing plants can also help to actively counteract emissions and improve local air quality. It also helps to support local wildlife. On top of this, trees may provide shade for cars in summer.
Install EV Charging Stations
Electric cars are becoming more popular and EV owners need somewhere to charge their car. Adding a couple EV chargers to your parking lot could be convenient to employees or visitors who use electric cars or hybrids. It’s also a way of actively promoting more sustainable travel — which is good for your company’s overall carbon footprint.
Add a Bike Shelter
Another way to promote sustainable travel could be to consider building bike shelters in your parking lot. These can provide a safe and sheltered space for employees or visitors to store their bicycle. This could be built within your parking lot or somewhere else around your company building.
Create Designated Carpool Spaces
Promoting carpooling could be recommended if you have a parking lot with limited space. Carpooling is when employees share a commute together in the same vehicle — reducing the cost of commuting and fostering relationships between employees. It also helps to combat congestion on the road and reduce emissions. These designated carpool spaces could be located nearest the building alongside disabled parking bays.
Implement Number Plate Recognition
Want to restrict who is allowed to park in your parking lot? Setting up cameras that use number plate recognition technology could be one way to do this. You could install a barrier on the entrance to your parking lot that only opens if a registered vehicle pulls up in front of it. Alternatively, if you have a lot of visitors, you could require all visitors to provide their registration plate at a desk or face a fine (which could be outlined on signs around your parking lot). This is a good idea if you only have a small parking lot.
Adopt a Parking App
If your parking lot requires visitors to pay to park, setting up a parking app could potentially be more convenient than having to use a meter. In a small private parking lot, you may even be able to use an app to allow employees and visitors to reserve spaces.
Provide Car Cleaning Services
Some large stores have car cleaning services on site, allowing customers to get their car cleaned while they shop. Some smaller companies meanwhile hire car cleaning services to come to their parking lot once per month on a certain day — employees can choose whether they want to have car washed and you could potentially pay for all car washes yourself, making it a unique employee benefit.