Drivers of trailers, trucks and bus coaches who apply for season parking tickets from Aug 1 will have to take part in a government study aimed at identifying the travel and parking patterns of heavy vehicles.
The Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) is calling a tender to collect travel and parking data of heavy vehicles with valid URA season parking tickets.
This is part of research with the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD) and the Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology (Smart).
"Understanding these parking patterns will help URA to identify locations that are suitable for the parking of heavy vehicles and better allocate the heavy vehicle parking spaces," said the authority yesterday in a press release.
There is high demand for public heavy-vehicle parking spaces near housing estates, the URA noted. While there are 44,000 spaces for the 34,400 registered heavy vehicles in Singapore, most of the spaces are in industrial areas and less than 25 per cent are near homes.
Providing heavy-vehicle parking spaces will be increasingly challenging as many of the existing parks will be needed for new homes and community facilities, the URA said. It has also received feedback from residents to relocate these parks because of noise, fumes and safety concerns.
The URA added that it will be changing the terms and conditions of its heavy-vehicle season parking tickets in parallel with the study.
The data collection exercise will involve installing global positioning system (GPS) devices in heavy vehicles to collect travel and parking data for one month.
The cost of the device, including installation and removal, will be borne fully by URA.
"There will be no infringement on the privacy of drivers... URA will not receive information that identifies individual vehicle owners or drivers," said the authority.
It added that all data collected will be used only for research and planning purposes and will be studied on a group basis.
Researchers and companies involved in the study must also sign legal agreements to keep all collected data confidential and must also destroy the data after the study has been completed.
Drivers will also be surveyed, on a voluntary basis, about issues such as the purpose of the heavy-vehicle trips and the time taken to pick up and deliver different goods.
Current holders of URA's heavy-vehicle season parking tickets will receive a letter with more details and a phone helpline to call if they have queries or wish to meet URA staff to discuss the matter.
