T.Nagar: No space to park

Last updated at 3.50 pm , Tuesday, October 30, 2007

By Karthik Krishnaswamy and Neha Raghunath

CHENNAI: It takes half an hour in peak time traffic to drive from one end of Panagal Park to the other, a distance of less than half a kilometre. Lack of parking spaces, prolonged construction of a flyover at South Usman Road and narrow space for pedestrians have compounded the traffic problems.No major shopping complex in T. Nagar

Vehicles surrounding a 'No-Parking' sign are a common sight in T. Nagar in the absence of parking spaces. Photo: Neha Raghunath/Digantik

has proper parking space, violating the CMDA’s development control regulations for commercial buildings, which has added to the woes of citizens.

According to these regulations, all multi-storied buildings must have a parking space for vehicles. Many buildings have converted the space in the basement reserved for car parking into commercial shops. A ‘no parking’ sign at every meter doesn’t stop textile shops like Nalli from having a reserved parking lot on the road behind the shop. Most shops in the area do not even offer parking facilities.

Parking in T. Nagar is a traumatic experience. Velumurugan, a taxi driver who made frequent trips to T. Nagar asked, “A car park can hold 500 cars, but what happens if 50,000 cars come together?” As long as commercial buildings continue to operate without parking facilities, there can be no long term resolution of the parking issue.

J Karunanidhi, the ward councillor believes that the parking situation in T.Nagar and other areas could be solved through construction of multilevel parking lots. Six such lots have been proposed in various locations in Chennai.

The CMDA (Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority) has engaged consultants Mecon Ltd. to prepare a Detailed Project Report (DPR) for a multilevel complex in Panagal Park. However, V. Palaniyappan, Deputy General Manager, Mecon Constructions explained, “We submitted our report a year ago. For now, further work has been suspended.”

“The Public and Urban Local Bodies aren’t being consulted for addressing area-specific issues”, says Rajesh Rangarajan, Consumer Action Guidance (CAG).According to him the issue of footpaths needs to be addressed urgently as there are a lot more pedestrians than vehicles on the roads. The lack of assigned footpaths causes pedestrians to walk on the road and narrow the vehicle passage.

Chennai has not followed a Master Plan since 1995. While remaining sceptical about the current approach of the CMDA, Rangarajan says, “This is the ideal opportunity to take a look at those 12 years, and see what went wrong, and not repeat those mistakes in the future.”