• In Gironde, an unprecedented real-time information system on the occupancy rate of beach car parks in four cities (Lacanau, Lège-Cap-Ferret, Le Porge and Carcans) is being deployed this summer.

  • It was successfully tested in three coastal towns last summer by the operator Alyce, in conjunction with the GIP Littoral.

  • It should make it possible to avoid the ten days of saturation of certain sites over the summer season.

“How can we prevent people from rushing on very busy roads and finding themselves getting upset at not finding places near the beaches?

summarizes Benoît Berthe, Innovation Director at Alyce, a company specializing in the collection of data on mobility.

After an experiment in the summer of 2021 in three cities, Lacanau, Lège-Cap-Ferret and Le Porge, Alyce's counting system, which provides real-time information on the occupancy rate of car parks near beaches is deployed this summer, including the town of Carcans.

This is the first device of its kind deployed in France by Alyce.

The public interest group (GIP) Littoral has been working on solutions for a while now to better inform summer visitors about beach attendance and avoid the ten days of saturation recorded on certain sites, each season.

As early as 2015, travel surveys were launched and attempts to count beachgoers were put in place, with the aim of establishing predictive models (via sensors recording wifi waves from cell phones or drones).

In 2017, ten million visitors were counted on the beaches at the regional level.

“This gives an idea of ​​the weight in the tourist offer in our region”, points out Elise Couturier, deputy director of the GIP Littoral.

For five years, attendance has increased: the tool developed by Alyce will allow us to see if it stabilizes at some point.

“Camera-based technology”

The technological solution proposed by Alyce is presented as a tool available to local authorities.

“We proposed a technology based on cameras with an artificial intelligence analysis module that makes it possible to count all the objects that will enter and leave car parks,” explains Benoît Berthe.

In many car parks, especially underground, a system of boxes in the ground makes it possible to detect vehicles entering.

This device was not possible because of the sand but also because the places in the car parks of the beaches are not always well defined.

“We also risked having false results, because we know that visitors sometimes park upstream, on the shoulders, continues the innovation director of Alyce.

The cameras count everything that enters the zone,

Interactive vignettes (widgets) will be activated from this Thursday, for the start of the school holidays, on the websites of the participating municipalities, that of the GIP and their social networks.

“In Lège-Cap-Ferret, this was one of the most consulted pages for the summer of 2021”, underlines Elise Couturier.

“We refined the widgets, and added indications on the places available according to the peaks of attendance, specifies Benoît Berthe.

We will be able to compare the measurements in real time with predictive calculations based on past years”.

They take into account the weather, the season and the day of the week.

Other cities in Gironde and elsewhere could quickly be interested in this unique metering solution.

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  • Bordeaux

  • Aquitaine

  • Beach

  • Attendance

  • Car park