Y.S. RANA, CHANDIGARH–FEB 5–When the Chandigarh Administration is making efforts for provision of vehicle parking at main city’s points, parking space is scarce resource in Chandigarh. Thus the situation is going bad to worse. The space was fully developed before the numbers of vehicles had reached at today’s levels. Increasing number of vehicles causes not only encroachment activities on the rise but also chaos on city’s roads. ‘Green’ turns in ‘brown’ as belts are being turned into illegal parking lots. Even parks meant for residents are now turned into parking lots.
The official data reveals that the total number of motorize vehicles in Chandigarh has witnessed more than 50times increased from12,345 in 1971 to more than seven lakh in 2011. It is on very high side when compared to other cities of the country, says the official of RLA, Chandigarh. Besides, it has the high rate of floating vehicular population from neighbouring cities, added he.
been encroached upon makes it difficult to pedestrian to move freely.
Now the parking situation has become so precarious that they are
forced to park their vehicles in the green belt areas specifically
marked for plantation and designed to keep the environment clean.
Areas near the public dealing offices and local hotels are
particularly vulnerable due to the shortage of parking space.
Green belt areas have been becoming ‘brown’ a common
sight in Chandigarh, especially in the congested sectors. A number of
cars are parked in a green belt of Sector 47 which has now turned into
grey belt. Residents have developed their own parking areas on
designated green belts, which are totally violating the rules of
Chandigarh Capital Development Act. Vacant spaces across the city have
already truned intoa problematic areas for visitors, who find it
difficult to move freely.
Sector 17 known as shopping Centre of Chandigarh has
been used green belts for parking lots and most of its greenry is now
missing. The visitors to the sector complained for lack of parking
spaces when they do not find any parking lot, they start parking
vehicles in green belts. Number of trees has been uprooted from the
sector to make space for thousands of vehicles now parked in queues
take concrete measures to meet this emerging problem because of the
rising number of vehicles in the capital of two states.
Meanwhile, encroachment activities are increasing in
various sectors of the city due to the negligence of the concerned
authorities. Vehicle owners have not spared even either side of road.
A large number of vehicles are parked on the side of roads makes it
difficult to move freely especially at market places.
The authority should take concrete measures to
discourage vehicle owners to destroy green belts and parking spaces
must be managed through regulations in order to balance need with
supply, said senior citizens of Sector 47.