Study area - Problem analysis - BMW FIZ Problem Analysis

3 Problem analysis

3.1 Study area

Figure 3 shows the current FIZ area, acting as a strategic point of interest in the northern part of Munich. The area is highly accessible by public transport, located next to the metro station Am Hart, which provides direct access to Munich Central Station, heading to the south, and to Munich airport via the connection to the regional train, heading to the north. The area can be accessed by major roads (Schleißheimer Straße and Frankfurter Ring), by public transport (metro and bus), as well as by active modes. Private BMW shuttle buses are also used to bring BMW employees to their workplace. Parking spaces are available in the close vicinity to these shuttle lines, effectively creating a local P+R system for BMW employees.

Figure 4 takes a closer look at the area and shows the present parking facilities in and around FIZ. Delineated in the legend, some sections of the parking supply are temporary while others are permanent, there is also parking not only for BMW-related employees but also for visitors.

Some parking facilities outside FIZ have also been identified as being used by BMW employees. However, in order to better manage the scope of this project, only the employee-based parking supply both owned and rented by BMW were considered. In terms of land-use, FIZ is located next to a large industrial area in the south-east (Euro Industrie Park) and surrounded by several residential areas (one in the south-west and larger zones in the north/north-east).

8 Figure 3: Transport infrastructure around the BMW FIZ area

9 Figure 4: Parking facilities and land-use in the FIZ area

10 For the present study, focus was put on parking facilities inside BMW FIZ and a limited area close to FIZ – zones accessible from FIZ entrances within less than 15 min walking. The study area follows the boundary used for the FIZ Future contest, as shown in dotted blue (see Figure 4).

However, many questions remain open for discussion regarding this choice. Since the study focuses on managing parking issues, a suitable study area should theoretically include all places where parking problems related to BMW FIZ are likely to occur. In the case of FIZ-related parkers (e.g., employees and visitors), parking patterns can be very complex as seen below in Table 3.

Table 3: Possible parking patterns by FIZ employees

Situation 1 People come, park their car in the FIZ surroundings (either off-street or on-street) and then walk into the FIZ.

Situation 2 People come by car, park their car close to a bus station from the free shuttle service available for BMW employees and then access the FIZ site by bus.

Situation 3 People come to Munich by car, park their car in a Park & Ride facility and then reach the FIZ site using U-Bahn or S-Bahn.

Situation 4 Alternative storylines such as people coming by public transport, stopping at a station close to the city centre and then taking car sharing to reach FIZ site.

Parking impacts can propagate much further than the area that generates them, effectively making it rather difficult to define an adequate study area. This also brings about questions concerning the data that has been provided to us by BMW. What is meant by approximately 50% of BMW employees commuting everyday by car? How was this percentage calculated?

How are situations 2, 3 and 4 taken into account? In addition, daily mobility patterns of BMW employees are more complex than just commuting from home to work. There can be various combinations of trips and trip-chains within one day, such as home-FIZ-other-FIZ-home, home-FIZ-airport and home-other-FIZ-home, situations that require a strong understanding of the respective mobility patterns.

According to the data provided by BMW, roughly 25% of employees have at least one outside activity per day (Schuh & Co, 2013). Which modes of transport are these people using?

Particular places of interest, such as industrial sites (other BMW locations, sites of partner companies where BMW employees attend meetings/conferences) and key transport nodes (Central Station, Munich airport etc.) are also likely to have a strong impact on the mobility behaviour of BMW employees. Simplifying the problem to a home- and work-based parking scenario does not suffice when more complex decisions are being made pre-trip and post-trip, decisions which can change and further have an effect on parking requirements.

11 3.2 Stakeholder analysis

After presenting the study area, it is necessary to focus on the main stakeholders involved in parking issues related to BMW FIZ. This section proposes a stakeholder analysis focused on identifying stakeholders, documenting their needs, assessing and analysing their importance and decision making power, managing expectations, and taking actions.

3.2.1 Overview

Table 4 offers a complete index that illustrates all stakeholders that are deemed to affect or be affected by the project.

Table 4: Stakeholder index

Stakeholder Description

BMW Group Main driver of the entire FIZ Future project. Both owns and rents parking spaces around the study area. Looking to bring about focus towards electromobility and car-sharing. Underpins car industry and Munich economy.

BMW FIZ employees Largest stakeholder of FIZ Future project. 26,000 people who require their mobility habits to be satisfied. Possibly causing problems for residents in the FIZ surrounding neighbourhoods. Also important political stakeholders for the City of Munich.

BMW workers unions Workers unions with influential bargaining powers are required to be engaged so as to have the overarching confirmation of employees to affect working conditions and benefits.

BMW FIZ visitors Important stakeholders, require attention in relation to their off-street parking rights at FIZ and their on-street parking behaviour.

The City of Munich Important stakeholder in terms of both parking regulation and enforcement.

Will be able to determine if regulation is acceptable in the study area. Also able to provide parking management metrics.

MVG Indirect stakeholder having control over public transport in Munich. Needs to be engaged in order to determine the effects of different parking supply scenarios on public transport. A state of no action by the stakeholder can directly induce more car trips, all which require parking.

Henn Main driver behind the architectural design of the FIZ Future project. Has detailed plans concerning the current and future parking supply and demand requirements of FIZ. Also holds industry know-how in terms of parking accessibility.

Residents Important political stakeholders. Currently concerned about their streets being taken away by BMW employees.

Businesses Small-sized stakeholders within the FIZ study area. Might require their parking rights to be secured so as to allow for customer turnover through parking.

Companies Medium-sized stakeholders within the FIZ study area. Might require their parking rights to be secured so their employees can still park in the area.

Delivery services Business deliveries to FIZ require their parking rights to be taken into account to ensure delivery reliability. These stakeholders possibly make up a large number of external visitors to FIZ.

Emergency services Require access to surrounding residential areas without being hindered by illegally parked cars.

Parking solution provider Industry know-how and experience in terms of which parking solutions would be feasible for FIZ and the study area.

Schools Possible future parking generators that might cause conflict with parking in the study area.

All stakeholders detailed in Table 4 are translated to the stakeholder matrix below in Figure 5. The measures of decision making power and importance are used to gauge how each stakeholder is to be treated throughout the progress of the project.

Figure 5: Parking management stakeholder matrix

Solving the parking problems within the FIZ study area poses many challenges. With all the necessary stakeholders having been detailed in Table 4 and Figure 5 above, such a diverse range of groups, organisations, authorities and individuals provides problems in itself.

Solutions that would best solve the problems of one stakeholder would only put a range of other stakeholders at a disadvantage, leaving no room for simple straightforward decision making. These problems are further exacerbated by not only having to take into account the importance and decision making power of stakeholders that use the private car for their work-based trips but also how they choose to go about their mobility. For example, stakeholders that car share, carpool, park & ride, as well as cycle, all mandate special planning for their own parking needs.

3.2.2 BMW FIZ Employees

There are approximately 26,000 employees working within BMW FIZ at present, the large majority of whom are required to be mobile for their work. In addition to these employees, FIZ needs to take into account the space required for their 1,700 visitors, up to 5,000 delivery services and 7,000 test vehicles (B. Grüber, personal communication, November 26, 2014).

With such a large number of persons and vehicles having to connect with FIZ every day, a significant parking supply is mandated. The total number of parking spaces for employees is approximately 9,100, with an additional 1,150 temporary parking spaces available. For test vehicles, 1,700 parking spaces along with an additional 1,900 temporary parking places are allocated (Schuh & Co, 2013). The total number of parking spaces for employees fits the

13 mandated amount of parking, stipulated by the City of Munich – namely one space for every two employees minus 20% (BMW Group & Landeshauptstadt München, 2013).

A summary of the parking capacities can be found below in Table 5, these figures are the closest representation of the current on-site parking capacities. Despite the static nature of the parking supply at FIZ, it is still rather complex to establish the locations of parking facilities, as well as their capacity and their purpose (places reserved for BMW employees, test vehicles and visitors). The data that was found were often out of date by many years, with it being rather difficult to differentiate between current and future capacities. The situation is made even more complex given that:

(1) Many parking places are temporary – cars being parked on the future construction site for FIZ extension

(2) Devices indicating how many parking places exist are defect – meaning that it is very difficult to evaluate the utilisation of parking facilities

Table 5: Existing parking infrastructure capacities

Parking User Permanent Parking Spaces

Temporary

Parking Spaces Total

Employees

(26,000) 9,100 1,150 10,250

Visitors

(1,700) N/A N/A N/A

Test Vehicles

(7,000) 1,700 1,900 3,600

* Values in parentheses denote the total number of the respective parking user.

In order to better understand the mobility patterns of FIZ employees a range of studies have been undertaken in recent years. In 2013, the Munich-based traffic consultancy Schuh & Co investigated the residential locations of BMW FIZ employees (see Schuh & Co, 2013).

Through evaluating a sample of 16,828 postcodes of internal staff, it was found that 52% of employees have their primary residential address in either the Munich region or its surrounding municipalities, while the remaining 48% come from the urban city region of Munich (see Figure 6).

14 Figure 6: BMW FIZ trip origins for employees (Schuh & Co, 2013)

In terms of modal split, between 40-50% of FIZ employees come to work by means of a private car, generating approximately 11,000 work-bound trips. And, with each of these trips requiring parking at any given time, it is observed that many employees park their cars in the adjacent residential areas as well as on future building sites. Schuh & Co made further observations regarding personnel arrival and departure times, reflected in Figure 7. They report a significant influx of personnel between 6 am and 8 am, with the highest volume being 1,500 people within 15 minutes. On the other hand, in terms of outflow, most personnel leave FIZ between 4 pm and 6 pm, with the highest volume being 1,100 people within 15 minutes.

Figure 7: Employee inflow and outflow, FIZ Area, Wednesday, 11 August 2012 (Schuh & Co, 2013)

15 Taking into account these inflows and outflows, it was found that over an entire working-week, the maximum number of personnel within FIZ, at any given time, fluctuates between 12,000 (Friday) and 14,000 (Tuesday) people between 6 am and 9:30 am (see Figure 8).

Considering that the amount of workers within FIZ at any given time, reaches a maximum of 14,000 – approximately 7,000 of who commute by means of a private car – it is possible that BMW FIZ employees already have their parking requirements satisfied. BMW, according to documents provided, supply 10,250 spaces for their employees at FIZ, not including the many temporary spaces. However, considering that BMW FIZ employees have previously voiced their concerns about parking garages being full at 8:30 am, these specific stakeholders as well as BMW AG need to be strongly engaged in order to address this disparity.

Figure 8: Employees present, FIZ Area, between 6:00 and 9:30 am (Schuh & Co, 2013) The figures above already provide a rather large amount of valuable information.

Nevertheless, it should be kept in mind that the available data is aggregated, meaning that it relies on averages reflecting neither individual variations nor temporal fluctuations. For example, the mode share of BMW employees commuting to FIZ is likely to be very different according to different periods of the year – e.g., the cycle modal split is much lower during winter.

3.2.3 BMW FIZ Mobility and Parking Strategy

In order to reduce the high demand for private-car mobility, mobility which usually results in increases in parking demand, BMW focuses on a range of strategies. These strategies fall into two areas, namely, promoting non-motorised modes and managing the mobility of its employees. In relation to the latter, BMW currently employs multiple pull-measures to reduce the amount of private motorised traffic. These measures include private shuttle bus systems, flexible working-times, subsidised public transport tickets, and parking management.

16 In terms of parking management, however, BMW has established a new parking strategy for FIZ Future. According to the future traffic volumes that will be triggered by the developments, BMW aims to have all of its necessary parking supply conveniently located for employees as well as visitors. Alongside standard car-parking spaces, the company also aims to have 6,000 to 10,000 spaces for test vehicles. At the same time, special priority is given within BMW’s strategy for parking spaces that are both attractive and accessible in terms of walking, so as to prevent on-street parking in the neighbouring areas.

In order to better protect the neighbouring areas from the large amounts of spillover parking induced by FIZ, BMW has concentrated part of its mobility strategy on the issue of on-street parking. The strategy considers controlling parking demand management through an in-house parking management system that, for example, controls who can drive to work depending on their place of residence (only those living further than 2 km away). In order to further protect residents and the neighbouring areas, BMW also aims to continue to engage the City of Munich government in order to establish parking management measures. In addition to this, parking management within FIZ will be improved upon, specifically though a traffic management study, so as to prevent parking spillover into the residential areas.

3.2.4 The City of Munich Government Parking Strategy

The City of Munich parking management strategy covers three major areas (Landeshauptstadt München, 2007). These areas concern the controlling of on-street parking, information for off-street parking, and providing supply for off-street parking (see Figure 9).

Figure 9: City of Munich parking management framework

The City of Munich further details its position in terms of each of the three major parking management strategy areas in Table 6.

Table 6: City of Munich parking management strategy breakdown (Landeshauptstadt München, 2009).

Control: On-street parking

 Controlling through:

- Resident parking - Pay-and-display parking - Short-stay parking zones

 Diversified by time and space and price

 Enforcement

 Reducing origin/destination private vehicle trips

 Reducing private vehicle parking search traffic

 Improving accessibility for residents

 Ensuring accessibility for companies, customers and visitors

 Encouraging more effective use of existing parking facilities

Information: Off-street parking

 Parking guidance systems

 Parking information systems

 Usage of private off-street parking spots by different user groups at different times

 Mobility management

Supply: Off-street parking

 Park+Ride and Bike+Ride facilities

 Resident parking facilities

 ‘2000 parking spots programme’

 PPP-programme to force investment in resident parking facilities

 Parking space restrictions through zoning maps

How each of the three major strategy areas is applied on the spatial scale across the Munich region is detailed below in Figure 10. FIZ is currently positioned within the ‘City Outside the Inner Ring’ zone, despite this, the City of Munich is in the process of bringing harsher regulatory measures to this zone.

Figure 10: City of Munich parking management spatial strategy (Landeshauptstadt München, 2009) In terms of how the City of Munich is looking to further advance its parking management program is well detailed. For the new FIZ Future development, recent documents dating back to as early as 2013 highlight new parking management trial areas in the northern neighbourhoods adjacent to FIZ (Landeshauptstadt München, 2013b). Despite the lack of details, these areas will include new ‘control: on-street parking’ regulatory measures, measures which will not be rolled out to the specific problem neighbourhoods to the east of

18 during a recent citizens’ discussion (BMW Group & Landeshauptstadt München, 2013).

Citizens from the municipalities of Milbertshofen-Am Hart and Feldmoching-Hasenbergl were invited by the BMW Group to obtain information and express their views concerning the current situation and their expectations for the FIZ Future project.

The first topic mentioned by citizens was the parking issues in the FIZ surroundings caused by visitors, delivery services and also BMW employees. According to the residents, there are enough parking places available at FIZ but these are located too far from the FIZ main entrance, thereby giving BMW employees the preference of parking in the residential areas nearby in order to walk less and save time going in and out of the parking facility. Concerns were also raised in relation to accessibility problems for emergency vehicles and supply services. In addition to the residential areas being saturated with cars, neither speed limitations nor ‘Tempo-30’ zones are respected.

Citizens also mention the saturation of the metro station am-Hart, which makes them avoid this station during peak hours. However, citizens can see a great difference during weekends, where they find it very pleasant to live close to FIZ. In addition, residents have a rather negative image of Schleißheimer Straße due to intense traffic flow and lack of crossing facilities, so much so that they consider the street as a ‘highway’. In a broader perspective, residents also think that FIZ and its neighbouring residential areas could be better integrated, something which could be partially achieved through better parking management.

Nevertheless, the residents consider the presence of BMW Group as great advantage for the city of Munich and think that FIZ Future is a real chance to improve the current situation.

Further in relation to parking issues, residents strongly believe that such issues should be taken into account in the elaboration of the FIZ Future concept. They think that this should be part of a broader mobility strategy to improve the current FIZ situation. Citizens believe that the main problem is not the lack of available parking places at FIZ but rather the current disposition of the places. They believe that the provision of additional parking places at FIZ

In document BMW FIZ Problem Analysis (Page 12-0)