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Parking enforcement & restraining traffic growth
Written By Naveen - 26 September, 2010
Bangalore parking traffic management Enforcement paid parking pay & park
Further to the meeting with Mr Praveen Sood, AdCP-Traffic, a project will be necessary to identify a workable approach to re-introduce parking regulations in the city.
A further long-term objective for the project would be to investigate possibilities for enforcement of congestion or cordon pricing, particularly in the CBDs.
The benefits from these would be :
1) Streamlining parking procedures in the city.
2) Orderly streets with less clutter of vehicles parked haphazardly.
3) Restraining traffic growth that will lead to lesser street congestion.
4) Possibilities for better performance of street-based public transport with congestion reduction.
5) Reversing the prevailing trend of excessive dependence on private vehicles & their dominance on the roads.
6) Reduced air pollution with reduction of vehicle volumes, etc.
As a precursor for the project, some ideas & discussions are desirable to determine problems & obstacles such as poor parking monitoring, possible sources of parking revenue leakages, well entrenched vested interests, possible opposition by public, etc..
Appreciate others' views & suggestions in this regard.
COMMENTS
idontspam - 26 September, 2010 - 06:58
It will help to identify an area and pilot it there. As discussed Koramangala is a good microcosm of overall Bangalore with commercial+residential mixed use.
silkboard - 26 September, 2010 - 16:42
If you can avoid cash transactions at the parking lot, you can control leakage as well as get monitoring done (using the device that you'd use for payment transaction).
Some wild thoughts:
- RTO has been issuing RC books as smart cards (so I read, haven't seen one myself). Can these be upgraded to have proximity cards? Park near a sensing meter, and you record a transaction. Pay aggregated parking fees every month or quarter at RTO / Bangalore One or BBMP website?
- Driver's Cell phone as the payment device? A data base linking Vehicle to cell phone would be a nice "side-benefit". Attendants or machines can just record car license numbers at random. If the number is not found to have a cell phone payment transaction on the same day, you can fine people.
rs - 26 September, 2010 - 16:59
I suppose the RTO can issue some sort of card which can be used - but that would exclude people who are not from Bangalore. The Cell phone idea is a good one as I'm sure a lot more people have cell phones than credit cards.
As far as enforcement is concerned - I think the best thing is to privatize this. One can require the private enforcer to take a digital photograph of the violation which shows clearly the licence plate and the violation. This would prevent unjustified fining. The whole process - including collection of the fee can be outsourced. In any case nowadays one can pay traffic fines online quite easily.
Ramesh
murali772 - 27 September, 2010 - 05:07
Levying of hefty road tax, introduction of congestion charge and putting high premium on parking are some of the measures the Centre for Science and Environment has suggested to Delhi Government to check growth of private vehicles and overcome the traffic mess in the city.
In a letter to Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, CSE citing examples of various cities including London, Stockholm and Tokyo, said experience from across the world showed that parking controls, parking pricing along with taxes top the list as first generation car restraint measures.
"For instance, Stockholm expects to generate equivalent to Rs 366 crore from congestion charges annually from this year that will be used for transit development," the CSE said also analysing the situation in major Indian cities.
Noting that Delhi must tap the revenue streams from "congestion charges and restraint taxes", the prominent environmental NGO said cars cannot continue to enjoy direct and hidden subsidy and privileges on roads.
"With congestion tax and good public transport, central London has reduced traffic volume by 25 per cent, congestion by 30 per cent. Singapore with ownership restrictions has kept the annual car growth rate well within 3 per cent as opposed to more than 10 per cent in Delhi," the CSE said.
"Indian cities including Delhi have begun to prepare parking policy but this must include parking controls and pricing to dampen car usage," it said.
For the full report in the Economic Times, click here
Scanned policy of BBMP parking policy?
vinay_sreenivasa - 2 October, 2010 - 16:17
IDS,
Were you able to scan and post the BBMP parking policy?
Thanks,
Vinay.
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