North Sydney Council are using unmarked cars, P plated drivers and new camera detection cameras attached to four wheel drive vehicles to snare motorist who have overstayed their parking time close to retail shopping centres and in side streets.
The Council who appear to be on a revenue splurge is using PinForce LPR vehicle mounted mobile licence plate recognition to snare hundreds of drivers in what appears to be a covert operation in both back streets and around shopping locations.
PinForce LPR provides electronic chalking for each vehicle it passes and automatically alerts the officer to any offending vehicle after a second pass once the parking restriction has lapsed.
When SmartHouse confronted Council staff operating one of the vehicles in North Sydney they demanded that we stop taking pictures of their vehicle.
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Mounted in the vehicle was a Panasonic Toughbook computer that appeared to be linked to NSW Government databases on the outside passenger side was a PinForce mounted camera that takes high resolution images of number plates and vehicles.
We observed the operators drive up two streets, stop issue tickets and then move on to another vehicle after they had done a run down the side street.
The vehicle is being used in both side streets and roads around high traffic retail areas from North Sydney to Cremorne and Neutral Bay.
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The system being used by North Sydney Council integrates with PinForce Mobile and complements the PinForce Sentinel system that is mounted on motor vehicles.
The Company claims that their technology is being used by the City of Melbourne, Brisbane City Council, North Sydney Council, City of Perth, City of Sydney, Waverley Council and Adelaide City Council to snare motorists.
They claim that local, state and federal government, police authorities, universities and private operators can enforce parking (and other) regulations resulting in a wide range of benefits, which we assume to be revenue raising.
What North Sydney has not explained is why the Council is not investing in road repairs or pavement upgrades with North Sydney Council having some of the worst pedestrian pavements in NSW.
Nor will they explain why North Sydney Council is not investing in what is Australia’s second largest business district with locals complaining that “at night the suburb is dead due to a lack of investment and over regulation by North Sydney Council”.
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PinForce LPR consists of advanced high speed digital cameras coupled with an integrated GPS system and sophisticated Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
All an operator needs to do is drive the equipped vehicle and PinForce LPR does the rest of the work by:
Taking a photo of every parked vehicle’s number plate
Searching a database hotlist for residential permits, warnings, vehicles of interest, stolen vehicles etc.
Triggering on-the-spot alerts
Transferring information into PinForce Mobile for on the spot ticketing or mailing.
PinForce LPR provides electronic chalking for each vehicle it passes and automatically alerts the officer to any offending vehicle after a second pass once the parking restriction has lapsed.
