Vijayawada: Vijayawada is fast growing with good number of commercial establishments coming up around the city, but the problem of vehicle parking is continuing to irk the motorists.
Since long, parking has been a major problem for shoppers in city and of late the inflow of vehicles, particularly cars, started increasing in the city in view of capital developments.
The VMC’s plans to equip parking lots in over 58 areas in the city as prescribed by the traffic police did not materialise fully owing to various reasons. Officials could only mark a few parking lots at MG Road near commercial establishments between Benz Circle and Police Control Room junction.
However, the rest of the city hardly has free parking lots. There are only a few parking lots maintained by private persons on contractual basis and one has to pay Rs 10 against Rs 7 fixed by VMC to park their vehicle even for a moment.
Some of the free parking bays are less used since they are far away from the commercial establishments and are insufficient. On the other hand, lack of cellars to several old buildings of the city is forcing motorists to park their vehicles on the roadsides of major roads in the city causing obstruction to the traffic.
A well-established hospital near the Executive Club has its cellar allotted for hospital purposes and forces vehicles on either sides of ITI Road up to 100 meters from the hospital building.
Similarly, many buildings that do not have cellar parking facility which are mandatory are a cause of concern. VMC also tried to earn by making road margins as paid parking lots on Eluru Road but failed as people opposed it.
“Proper parking facility is something people of Vijayawada do not get forever. As the number of establishments grow number of vehicles visiting them too grow and cause traffic jams at the end,” said J. Somesh at Gurunanak Nagar, which is turning out to be a place of parking problems.
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