More than one million fines handed out by Parking.Brussels last year

Parking.Brussels, which enforces parking policies in 10 of Brussels’ 19 municipalities, handed out a whopping 1.1 million fines last year. Schaerbeek was responsible for a full 30% of the parking fines.

The figures come from Brussels mobility minister Elke Van den Brandt (Groen) in answer to a parliamentary question from Françoise Schepmans (MR). The number of fines administered are particularly impressive considering that patrols were not carried out last April because of the lockdown.

The fewest fines were administered in May (43,000), and the most in October (160,000). Schaerbeek is the most densely populated of the 10 municipalities and also has the most public parking spots, so logically had the most fines. It still punched in above its weight, though, with 347,822 of the fines.

Parking.Brussels attributes the large number of fines to the use of high-tech scanning cameras attached to cars that patrol the city streets. They can scan 1,200 parked cars in an hour compared to 450 cars a day that can be checked by parking wardens.

‘Encouraging’

“The results are very encouraging because fines motivate people to respect parking regulations,” Sara Jasmes of Parking.Brussels told Bruzz. “That in turn leads to a better rotation of cars in the short-term-parking zones, making it easier for residents to park their own cars.”

Van den Brandt noted that figures could not be calculated for contested parking fines because they are contested through a number of channels. A centralised system is being launched, however, to make these statistics possible to gather.

It is worth contesting the ticket if a driver feels it was unfairly sent. That’s because the ‘scan cars’ as they’re referred to, are not foolproof. “They can’t tell the difference between a car stopped temporarily and one that is parked,” Schepmans told parliament. “They also don’t allow for the time a driver needs between parking and paying for the spot.”

Photo courtesy Parking.Brussels