Digital visitor’s pass for whole city

The last paper visitor’s passes will be phased out of The Hague this week. They will be replaced by the digital visitor’s parking permit where there is paid parking.

According to Deputy Mayor Peter Smit (Transportation), in the first months after the digital visitor’s pass was introduced users certainly got riled up over the number of hours on the pass. ‘However, in the areas where the pass was introduced more than a year ago, surveys show that 80 to 90% of the users still have hours left on their pass at the end of the permit year,’ explained Smit.

The digital visitor’s parking permit was introduced in 2007. The digital visitor’s parking permit replaced the paper visitor's pass and parking clock, which was valid for a maximum of two hours.

In practice the paper system led to misuse and in many cases the parking clock was reset after two hours. In this way the visitor’s pass served as a resident’s permit ‘in disguise’. The digital pass put an end to the 2-hour parking maximum. The new system is also more convenient because residents can purchase an additional pass if they have more than one visitor at the same time.

New proposal

The number of hours on the visitor's pass depend upon the weekly number of hours of paid parking in a particular area. The hours are valid for one year.

In October 2011 The Hague Municipal Executive submitted a proposal to the Municipal Council for a new system in which residents could still register their visitors by telephone or the website once the pass ran out of hours. The additionally ‘purchased’ hours would then be deducted from the resident permit holder’s bank account. This way visitors would not need to use the ticket dispensers.

Click here for more information on how the digital visitor's pass works.