New colour parking kiosk screen passes cold-weather test
NEWS/ CITY HALL — A new colour parking-kiosk screen appears to have made it through the cold snap unscathed.
New kiosk screen that was tested in July is now getting cold-weather test.
“So far, so good,” said community services director David Duckworth Tuesday during a report to City council that recommended freezing the current parking rate at $1 an hour through 2015.
Council approved the recommendation but Coun. Donovan Cavers wondered how the new colour screen on the kiosk in front of Motivo’s coffee shop has been working through the cold weather.
Duckworth said it hasn’t had any problems and the City has ordered two more for installation within the next month or so. They will be monitored throughout the winter.
He said each new screen costs $2,000 so approval will be sought from council before further money is spent. There are 94 kiosks in the downtown area.
“That colour screen is a lot more user friendly,” remarked Cavers.
ArmchairMayor.ca 
On those parking meters, I will vote with my wheels, and avoid the downtown area like the plague. You won’t see me there unless I totally, absolutely have to go. And I hope that to be very, very rarely.
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In regards to the parking meters it is a joke.
Why do we throw money on a dead project. I say over and over, the previous council for the most, not including Donovan Cavers, and Marg Spina all decided on these meters way, way, way to fast.
And If the old displays, that had issues in the cold, should cold not have been a application for the meters in the first place??? were they not tested in the cold? do I think spending huge amounts of money for something that is slow, cumbersome, can be offline with issues not even related to the city (ie: Internet, or Server Issues — Already Happened), lets spend another for now $4000, and later 200k to fix a problem? there is where the joke lies.
The screen issue doesn’t address the ‘latency issue’, doesn’t address the fact that anyone using a non-cash payment has a transaction go to another country, through the public internet, just asking for a breech, paying a toll for the life of the system to a company. Done right, there would be no internet to traverse, latency wouldn’t be a issue, and the system would be under control of the city, rather than by another company in another country for that matter.
My Next thought, if “COLD” is a problem for the meters now, how much does it cost to maintain the batteries? … this will be the next issue. If they charge $2000 for a screen, I imagine a battery is worth $500 at least.
We need to get a grip on useless spending, I would hope one of the agenda’s of the new council is to review the parking meters, before spending more useless $$ on them, and I hope for the sake of Kamloops taxpayers that they never got rid of the old ones because we need them back.
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What a Joke!!! $200k for new screens that doesn’t solve:
1) Privacy issues — I do not want my CC information, or any information traversing to a server in the EU …. It should stay in Kamloops.
2) Slowness Issue — Until the servers are located in kamloops, we are going to have latency issues no matter what.
3) Overall Experience Issue — I hate this system, I have change in my car ready to feed a meter, I could care less about using anything else except CHANGE..
4) Huge Waste of Money Issue — We need to spend our tax dollars on something that is actually beneficial to the city… these are not…
5) Take a Vote — Yes… DO THIS PLEASE. Let the Taxpayers decide, if we lose the vote, I promise never to comment nor bring up the topic.. but this was a very very poor decision, and needs to be reversed like vernon did.
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This is ludicrous ! You can replace a laptop screen ( complete ) for less than $200 if you have a little manual dexterity, and can follow instruction. I said that these kiosks would be an endless money pit, with Kamloops taxpayers being continually gouged for repairs, etc back before they were installed. There is not going to be any surplus from these to be put away towards more parkades , that is just a pipe dream of the city managers that pushed this idea on a gullible council that lacks the cojones to say no to them.
” So far, so good,” said community services director David Duckworth ” on the new color screen being tested. A test of a few months for an expenditure of many thousands of dollars to replace screens, and no one has any idea when the underlying problems will be fixed, if ever. What a friggin joke the leadership in Kamloops is.
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The leadership in Kamloops is not a “friggin joke” at all. They have been voted in by Kam-loooop-sians. Or do you mean….? Oh, I get you and I agree. We are held “hostages” by our own kind. We are at the beginning of another cycle, four years this time. I will more than happy to be the catalyst for a little local revolution. Get in touch and we can talk about it. Always available!
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At the time the change was being contemplated, we were assured that these new kiosks would be a massive improvement over the old meters — and it would be worth it to pay double to park downtown. $2000 per new screen??? This is ridiculous. People tell me they avoid going downtown because of the kiosks — I feel sorry for the downtown merchants who are paying the price of this fiasco. Bring back the old meters for cheap, or live with the crappy models that the city chose and force the decision-makers to use them daily as a reminder to be more prudent next time. NO MORE MONEY FOR PARKING KIOSKS!
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The bad news is, there will be more money going in for the parking kiosk. Given electronic obsolescence, software upgrades and related glitches and corporate ownership changes as frequent as Italy’s governance, we will be in it for-ev-er.
The good news is this council and senior management will be more cautious going forward, or at least that’s the hope.
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Interesting fact: Since Italy reformed its voting system in 1994, Canada is likely the most unstable of the major democracies, with 21 elections since WW2, compared with 17 in Italy.
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