Case Study: City of Guelph boosts parking enforcement efficiency and coverage with Genetec’s AutoVu LPR system

City of Guelph Installs Genetec's AutoVu License Plate Recognition System to Increase Efficiency of Bylaw Enforcement

The City of Guelph (population 118,000) faced a significant enforcement challenge after replacing downtown parking meters with a two-hour daily maximum and taking on contracts for 16 private lots, creating a complex mix of timed, permit, re-park and overnight-exemption rules across roughly 654 downtown on‑street spaces, nine municipal lots and >5,000 private spaces. With officers’ time split across other bylaw duties and manual, time-consuming patrol methods, Guelph sought a license-plate‑recognition solution and selected Genetec’s AutoVu.

Genetec installed AutoVu (vehicle-mounted Sharp LPR cameras, AutoVu Navigator, Tire Imaging and AutoVu Patroller with Security Center backend) on two city vehicles and integrated it with Guelph’s Nordat exemptions database and wireless transfer systems. The result: downtown patrols shifted from two officers each doing 3.5–4 hour circuits to one on-foot officer and one AutoVu vehicle, freeing a third officer for other bylaws, converting overnight foot checks to quick drive-through scans, reducing public complaints to “only a limited number,” lowering ticket disputes and court time, and delivering faster, more consistent enforcement across the city.

City of Guelph

Doug Godfrey

Manager of Bylaw Compliance and Security