Two fixed parking slots per home as project to unclog Delhi begins

Residents in South Delhi’s Lajpat Nagar and Kailash Colony will soon be allotted parking spaces and issued permit stickers for their designated spots as part of a pilot project to decongest the Capital that will soon extend to other localities, officials of the South Delhi Municipal Corporation said on Monday.

A joint team of the municipal corporation and Residents Welfare Associations (RWAs) began earmarking slots for private cars on Sunday after counting the number of vehicles in Lajpat Nagar III and a section of Lajpat Nagar II, said deputy commissioner (remunerative and project cell) Prem Shankar Jha. Each floor of the colony’s houses will be provided two parking slots, he said.

“Those with more than two cars will have to park their extra vehicles at the paid parking spots or make their own arrangement. If vehicles are not parked in the earmarked spaces, they will be towed by the municipal department or the traffic police,” another senior civic agency officer said on the condition of anonymity. The number of spaces allotted to each house may vary in other areas the project covers in the future, the official said.

The parking slots, however, may not necessarily be assigned close to the car owner’s house. “The RWA with the coordination from civic officials will issue a parking sticker for each resident’s vehicle, with the parking slot details. The parking slot may or may not be in front of the resident’s house. No extra vehicles will be allowed,” said Ashwani Marwah, joint secretary of the Lajpat Nagar Market Association.

Jha said a survey conducted jointly with resident and market welfare associations revealed that there were 1,744 flats in Lajpat Nagar III and Lajpat Nagar II C-block, which had 3,640 vehicles. It found 200 vehicles parked on the main road outside the residential areas and in the market.

The project is part of Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal’s Parking Management Area Plan (PMAP), which was launched early this year to decongest residential colonies across the city. Delhi’s vehicular traffic is rising at an alarming rate, with about 3.6 million private cars running on the Capital’s streets last year.

About 1,500 cars are registered in Delhi every day, according to figures released by the transport department.

Civic agencies had been asked to come up with parking plans for residential areas after the L-G approved the draft Delhi Maintenance and Management of Parking Rules, 2017, in January this year. The rules also mandated that new parking rates for public and residential areas be fixed by July this year, ending the free use of public space for parking. The SDMC, however, will not charge any fee for roadside parking at the moment, Jha said.

The official said non-residents visiting the areas will have to park their vehicles at paid lots. The SDMA has begun a process to issue tenders for the construction of 25 paid stack parking lots near residential colonies and markets.

The lots will comes up in areas including Rajouri Garden, Greater Kailash M Block, Malviya Nagar main market, Safdarjung Development Area Market, near Adchini Village and near Hauz Khas Apartments. Residents will be also able to book their parking space through a mobile app, said Shikha Rai, standing committee chairman, SDMC. She said the parking lots will have a total capacity of about 3,700 cars and will be operational by December 2019.

Under the pilot project, the municipal corporation will experiment organising parking spots in common areas so that internal roads of colonies are free for the movement of emergency vehicles and residents, he said.

Jha said all residents in the two areas of Lajpat Nagar will be issued parking stickers within the fortnight. After Lajpat Nagar, the officials will start work on assigning parking areas to residents in Kailash Colony.

The project will be extended to other areas of the city once Baijal notifies the final parking policy. “Only the south municipal corporation has submitted their parking area management plan. Once the other agencies such as the North, East and the New Delhi municipal council submit their plans, this policy will be implemented by the L-G across the city,” said an officer who asked not to be named.

Officials of the SDMC said the parking policy will also aim to make markets pedestrian-friendly. “The steps… (will) encourage drivers to use multi-level parking areas. We will be the nodal agency for implementing parking plans in municipal areas,” said an SDMC official.