There is hardly any busy road or street that does not include car park barriers. The purpose of installing car park barriers is to restrict illegal trespassers. This would in turn control traffic flow and thus offer lot of convenience to people.

Car park barrier aid in controlling vehicle flow at various check posts and only allow passing after undergoing through checking. There are various kinds of car park barriers that are being located at various places.

These Car park barriers could either manned or unmanned which are also known as automatic barriers. Automatic car park barriers help in exercising full control over flow of vehicles round the clock. Sudden changes in climatic conditions are not at a hindrance in the operation of these automatic barriers.

Another common variant of car park barrier is pay and exit type. In this system, the barrier rises and allows you to pass by upon insertion of your ticket. Some of these come with inbuilt sensors that give out the exact time when you have passed through them.

In terms of safety to car owners, there are two kinds of car park barriers; column mounted and floor mounted. Although the purpose of both is same (preventing vehicles from breaching car park perimeter) they both work with slight variations. These two barriers are further classified into flexible and rigid options.

Flexible car park barriers are designed to withstand minor knocks without causing any damage to the barrier or the vehicle. Damages caused to vehicles is minimised in this kind of system and hence the chances of injury to the passenger is reduced.

Rigid car park barriers on the other hand stop vehicles but the possibility of causing damage to the vehicle and its occupant passenger are high. Now let us take a look at the two main types of car park barriers that we have discussed earlier.

• Column mounted car park barrier: The key benefit of using this system is that they hardly have any footprint in the parking area thereby provide ample space for parking. These can be mounted directly on structural columns with interim posts fitted. This makes them ideal for huge constructions and new buildings. Designers can assess the impact of forces and their impact in case of any adversity.

• Floor mount barriers on the other hand are the only option for places where columns are not available to set up barriers for ramps, split levels, car park approaches or in order to protect door ways. Floor mount car park barriers are also the only choice available for perimeter refurbishments in order to minimise structural upgrading.

Theft and damage are the two main concerns for any car owner. In spite of parking their vehicles in appropriate places, these two fears keep haunting the minds of car owners. However with car park barriers in place, both risks that may arise due to theft and damage can be averted or at least minimised.