“Green” has become a standing item on parking conference agendas this year. It’s easy to assume that means electric vehicles, but for most operators in 2019 the sustainability gains are far more ordinary than a bank of EV chargers — and far more immediate.
Here’s a realistic look at where a parking operation can actually reduce its footprint today, and where EV fits in honestly.
Start with the boring wins
The biggest, fastest sustainability improvements in a parking facility usually have nothing to do with cars at all:
- Lighting. A garage or lot runs its lights for a huge share of the day. Moving to LED — ideally with occupancy and daylight controls — is often the single largest energy reduction available, and it pays back on the power bill alone. (We went deep on this in LED Lighting for Parking Structures.)
- Right-sized equipment. Modern entry, exit, and payment equipment draws less power and needs fewer service trips than the gear it replaces. Fewer truck rolls is a quiet but real emissions win.
- Less circling. Drivers hunting for a space burn fuel and clog the entry. Clear wayfinding and good signage cut that wasted movement — a sustainability measure that also improves the customer experience.
None of these are flashy. All of them are achievable in 2019 with proven equipment and a normal capital budget.
Where EV actually stands
Electric vehicles are coming — but in 2019 they’re still a small slice of the cars entering most facilities. The honest framing for this year is plan, don’t overbuild:
- A handful of charging stations in a visible location signals that you’re forward-looking and serves the early adopters who are arriving now.
- The smarter long-term move is making sure your electrical infrastructure and conduit can grow as demand does, rather than wiring a whole deck for chargers that will sit idle.
It’s also worth being clear about roles. Parking BOXX builds the parking system — entry, exit, payment, and access control. Charging hardware itself comes from dedicated EV charging providers, and we work alongside those partners so the charging experience and the parking transaction fit together cleanly. We’re not asking you to buy chargers from us; we’re making sure the parking side is ready for them.
A word on what we don’t do
You’ll see “solar-powered parking” in some 2019 marketing. We don’t offer solar on our equipment, and we’d rather be straight about that than imply a capability we don’t provide. Where operators ask us about resilience — keeping gates and payment working through an outage — the dependable answers are battery backup, industrial UPS units, and backup generators, not panels on the canopy.
The 2019 takeaway
Sustainability in parking this year is mostly won with lighting, efficient equipment, and smarter traffic flow — measures that cut both emissions and operating cost. Treat EV charging as a real but early trend: put in a visible starter installation if it fits your site, make sure the infrastructure can scale, and lean on charging specialists for the chargers themselves.
Planning a refresh that’s easier on the power bill and ready for what’s next? Talk to Parking BOXX about modern, efficient parking equipment — and how it fits with the EV charging partners already serving your market.