This issue of Parking Today is replete with examples of parking companies that have collaborated to improve the parking experience. Some collaborations, however, happen on a personal level. And those partnerships can have just as big of an impact on parking owners and operators and their customers.
Such is the story of Professional Parking Technologies (ProParking), LLC, a parking technology company that was launched last November. Founded by industry veterans Brent Van Loggerenberg and Blair Taylor, ProParking sells, installs, and services comprehensive parking systems comprised of multiple technologies that parking owners and operators need to meet their unique needs.
The longtime friends come from different ends of the parking industry, and they believe that their different, yet complimentary, sets of experience and expertise allow them to better understand owners’ technology needs. Van Loggerenberg is a technology professional with more than 25 years of experience. His parking career began in 2008, when he joined Sentry Control Systems, a parking technology reseller that was eventually acquired by SKIDATA. After leaving Sentry, he started and managed several parking technology companies, including Remote Command Center U.S.A., a parking customer service company providing live 24/7 support, and Nguni Parking Solutions, a full systems integrator of frictionless PARCS and guidance solutions.
Taylor brings a combination of operator and technology experience to the partnership. A parking professional with 35 years of experience, he spent the past 9 years serving as VP of Business Development for SKIDATA. Prior to that, he served in senior leadership positions for both SP+ and Colonial Parking.
“Over the past decade we’ve worked on projects together and competed against each other at other times,” said Van Loggerenberg. “Over that time, we gained a lot of respect for each other and became great friends. We have different sets of experience and expertise, and we complement each other perfectly.”
An Innovated Approach
Van Loggerenberg and Taylor feel that they’ve hit upon an innovative approach to building parking technology systems.
“Owners and operators often find it challenging to know which technologies would best meet their needs,” said Van Loggerenberg. “Our goal is to take the guesswork out of selecting parking technologies by evaluating owners’ and operators’ current and future needs and creating comprehensive systems and best-of-breed tools that will meet those needs.”
Today’s parking industry revolves around automation. Parking owners, developers, and organizations with parking assets have steadily been automating those parking assets to make their garages and lots more user friendly and manageable. Automation has the added benefit of reducing personnel costs, minimizing theft and fraud, and permitting the reassignment of parking staff to other critical areas within parking operations. The Covid pandemic accelerated that trend as owners and operators sought to protect the health and welfare of staff and patrons alike by limiting interpersonal interactions.
“Automating parking allows owners and operators to provide a better parking experience, while operating parking assets more efficiently and cost-effectively,” said Blair Taylor. “And with the impending introduction of smart cities, self-driving vehicles, and other vehicle technology, automation will become even more important in the coming years. That’s why it’s so important to take the uncertainty out of automating parking facilities.”
The idea is to create parking systems comprised of different technologies that, when combined, can help owners, operators, and organizations with parking assets meet their unique needs. They don’t apply cookie-cutter solutions, and they don’t sell equipment that doesn’t address owners’ specific needs or future requirements. ProParking sells, installs, and services industry-leading PARCS equipment, parking guidance technology, EV charging solutions, cellular augmentation solutions, and cloud-based parking management platforms and apps.
“We are creating highly targeted parking systems that are specifically designed to help parking owners and operators thrive,” said Taylor.
Innovators
Van Loggerenberg and Taylor’s commitment to innovation doesn’t end with creating and implementing parking technology systems. Because of their deep knowledge of parking and how parking impacts building, complex, and institutional owners, they also work to promote new ways to make parking facilities even more impactful.
The first manifestation of this was the introduction in February of CellRaven️™, a groundbreaking product that provides reliable and cost-effective cellphone connectivity throughout buildings and building complexes, as well as parking facilities and underground parking garages. The proprietary formula reengineers enterprise WiFi delivery to smartphones throughout any building and underground parking facility.
CellRaven’s enterprise solution offers high speeds, strong signals, and the ability to mold the solution to meet the specific cellular needs of building owners. Repeaters are strategically placed throughout underground garages to provide the necessary coverage, even for people in moving vehicles. Additional repeaters can be placed in lobbies and other common areas, as well as on individual floors, to assure a strong and consistent signal throughout the building.
In addition to improving cell coverage, CellRaven also provides important parking benefits. Because newer IP-based PARCS, Parking Guidance Systems, and EV Chargers rely heavily on connectivity, the system can also be used to connect these and other technologies and apps to cloud-based applications or to communicate with command centers and other remote sites. It can also connect parkers using other parking technologies like mobile payment, pre-booking, or EV Charging
“The introduction of CellRaven was very exciting for us, and has been extremely successful,” said Van Loggerenberg. “We are incredibly proud to have developed something like this that can be so beneficial to building and parking owners.”
Friends and Collaborators
The experience of Brent Van Loggerenberg and Blair Taylor demonstrates that collaborations don’t need to be among large companies to make an impact on the parking industry. This partnership among long-time parking professionals shows how even modest-sized collaborations can make a very real difference to the industry and parking organizations.
“We live in an entrepreneurial world, where good ideas and knowing how to implement those ideas can be extremely important,” said Taylor. “I think that we are just the tip of the spear when it comes to entrepreneurialism transforming the parking industry.”
Alan Craig is a business and technology writer. He can be reached at alan.craig417@gmail.com.
