Cale Access Celebrates 50th Anniversary and Announces New Installations

The company name CALE was created from four letters in the names of the company’s founders – Carl-Axel Andersson and his cousin Lennart Fungdahl.

Carl Axel was a real inventor that often gave birth to his ideas while dreaming. Afraid of forgetting a splendid idea while rushing for a pen and a piece of paper, he had a big drawing board close to his bed.

One of his early inventions was some kind of an icing bag and nozzle. Carl-Axel drew his inspiration for his parking inventions from an American parking meter, including the principle for coin detection and that different types of coins each buy a specific amount of parking time.

Customer-Friendly Parking In Berlin

At the same time as the Schleidenplatz square in the district of Berlin-Friedrichshain was being redeveloped, a new parking concept was also introduced which distinctly improved the parking situation for the local residents. Previously, during the day, the parking spaces were mainly occupied by shop employees and by car drivers using the park & ride service.

The city’s board of administration has now, for the benefit of the shopping customers, launched an extremely customer- friendly parking solution. To avoid worrying about their parking time expiring while shopping or visiting a doctor, drivers can now pay when returning to their car and only for the actual time used. The Cale parking terminals used for this solution have special signs.


”Customers can now go shopping with peace of mind” says Dr Schulz, the Town Development Officer. He also explains that parking attendants patrol the parking zone.
The new post payment system operates in the following way: The driver parks his car, walks up to the Cale terminal and inserts a payment card with credit function. No fee is charged at this moment. Only the arrival time is registered. The driver receives a receipt ticket with the arrival time and puts the ticket behind the windscreen in the normal way. When returning to the car, the driver once again uses the same card in the terminal which charges the parking fee for the exact time parked.

Stefan Dittrich, president of the company Stadtraum GmbH, says that the principle advantage with the new parking system is that the drivers don’t have to estimate their parking time in advance. Instead, they pay when leaving the parking space and then only for the time actually used.

Resistance to vandalism

Cale BriParc have recently installed a total of 23 mains powered pay and display terminals across the City of Sunderland, UK. Cale terminals were chosen primarily for their resistance to vandalism as well as for their sleek, subtle appearance, as many of the terminals were to be located in the more historic areas of the city.

All of the Cale terminals at Sunderland are linked to a central back office computer via the GSM network. The Windows based software allows the Council to remotely operate ticket vend statistics, audit and event information. In the event of a warning or alarm, such as a terminal is running low on tickets or the cash box will soon need emptying, the terminal will dial up and report to the central computer. An SMS text message alarm can then be sent to a prescheduled mobile phone. Different alarm types can be sent to different scheduled phones according to the time of day. As an example, an out of hours cash box removal can be reported to an appropriate officer.

Focus On Operation Efficiency

In the UK, the North Somerset District Coun cil have recently installed 26 Cale MP 104 Pay and Display terminals at various locations in Weston-super-Mare and Clevedon. Fifteen mains powered terminals were installed to replace existing equipment, whilst the remaining 11 are solar powered terminals at new locations. Solar power was chosen primarily to keep installation costs to a mini mum, and to increase flexibility, as it was therefore not necessary to connect the terminal to a mains power supply.

As the majority of the terminals were to be located at seafront locations, and therefore continually exposed to salty air, it was important for the Council to source terminals that would withstand corrosion. Cale pay and display machines are constructed from stainless steel as standard and incorporate various other anti-corrosion properties, which is why Cale pay and display terminals are successfully operating at many coastal locations across the United Kingdom and beyond.

North Somerset are shortly to upgrade their back office software to Cale Web Office, the innovative web based package from Cale Access that allows for the monitoring, programming and controlling of their pay and display terminals. Cale Web Office allows the operator to work with status information, reports and statistics directly and securely via a regular internet browser.
As the application is web based, a computer with access to the Internet is all that is required, no additional special software needs to be installed. As each user logs in to the system with their own unique username and password, each member of the parking management team can be assigned with varying appropriate levels of access within the system.