Give parking space to trucks and buses

Thursday, Feb 03, 2011




You may soon find Delhi's parking lots open round the clock. Delhi government on Tuesday asked Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) to provide space to trucks and buses in its parking lots, which are otherwise parked along narrow roads on residential colonies resulting in traffic chaos.

Delhi chief secretary Rakesh Mehta said MCD has been asked to accommodate such tempos and buses in its parking lots, which remain vacant during the night.  The direction came in response to the complaint of the traffic police that illegally parked commercial vehicles often cause traffic chaos on Delhi's streets.

According to a senior traffic police officer, illegally parked vehicles along narrow colony roads not only cause traffic jams but also result in accidents sometimes.  The officer said that these vehicles are generally parked in unattended and unlit areas and are difficult to be spotted at nights. While  the  problem  exists  in  almost  all over Delhi, the traffic police officer  especially  pointed  out  Karol  Bagh, Dev Nagar and Anand Parbat, which are hub of tourist buses.

"The commercial vehicles need a place to park only at nights. This is the time when MCD's parking lots are generally vacant. Such an arrangement would solve traffic police's problem and would also mean more money to parking contractors," Mehta said.

A senior MCD official said they would work out a concrete plan in this regard soon and present it to the traffic police and Delhi government soon.

The traffic police also sought government's intervention to ensure continuous electricity supply to traffic signals at major intersection in the Capital. Traffic police argued that electricity cut leads to traffic signal failure and cause traffic snarls.  They argued that some of these intersections are very critical and dysfunctional traffic signals spell chaos in no time.

Mehta said the traffic police have been asked to prepare a list of such critical junctions. "I have asked the discoms to provide power supply to these signals from 2-3 different feeder lines. In case of power cut from in one feeder the supply from the other feeder would keep these signals working," Mehta said.

Original news source http://www.hindustantimes.com/Give-parking-space-to-trucks-and-buses/Article1-657797.aspx