City, a big mess!

by Rupang Bhatt, Ahmedabad, 27 June, 2014

It’s a big mess!

We have increasing number of shopping centers on both sides of main road with number of shops in series.

In most new buildings, parking for these shops is allotted in basement.

However, no-one likes to park vehicle in basement. So all those owing the shops, working in the shops and visiting the shops park their vehicles/cars outside the shop on road.

In many cases, the surface space between the road/footpath and the shops is available in enough measurement for parking, but in most cases such space is purposefully elevated without provision of slope. This space is actually used as an extended part of the shop or for other commercial activity. Say for example if there’s a restaurant. They will put their tables and chairs on available frontal space which is bit higher than the level of road. The vehicles in such cases will be parked on footpath(if it is not used commercially), or on road.

The Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation(AMC) has started drive against such buildings. The AMC team yesterday sealed shops of Dhananjay Tower on Shyamal Char rasta-Prahladnagar garden road on parking issue.

If you think, this created fear among other buildings and the shop owners and building users started taking corrective steps, you are wrong!

The building users and shop keepers instead of taking correctives steps, today attacked the AMC and observed strike in protest on Shyamal-Prahlad nagar road.

As always, media was sympathetic to them and projected invalid, illegal and rubbish complains of shop owners on TV screen and in print. The complains like, “AMC people fine us for last fifteen days over parking issue……Responsibility of regulating parked vehicle is assigned to police, and we are not responsible.”

A few months back, the AMC sealed city’s very famous ‘Central Mall’ near CG road. The mall operators had rented frontal space of mall to ride operators. So there were several rides for kids occupying the frontal space which could be actually used for parking of at least two-wheelers. Though there was a basement, it was used for car parking, the those visiting the mall on two wheelers were occupying footpath outside the mall for parking. After AMC’s seal, the mall operators agreed to vacate the frontal space and converted it into two-wheeler parking. The usage of footpath as two-wheeler parking was stopped.

We have so much population(and that too undisciplined, disrespectful to rules and laws) that government fails to deal with each and everyone. AMC’s efforts are lesser but worth admiring. Shop owners may please vacate frontal space, they may please hire persons to regulate parking and make both footpath and road free for traffic without any obstruction.