Municipal bodies to fix actual levy, RWAS say rates ‘too high’
Residents ask if pedestrian and parking infrastructure will be upgraded with the increased revenue
IT MAY TAKE A FEW WEEKS UNTIL THE MCDS ACTUALLY GET TO BEGIN WORK ON THE NEW FEE
NEWDELHI: While the recommendations of the committees mandated under Delhi’s parking rules will be binding on the city’s municipal corporations, they will still have the power to make changes to the proposed fees, senior officials of the civic agencies said on Wednesday.
Weeks after the ‘Delhi Maintenance and Management of Parking Places Rules, 2019’ was notified by the state government on September 25, the Base Parking Fee (BPF) committee on Wednesday submitted its recommendations to the apex monitoring committee for its final approval.
In the report, the panel on BPF suggested keeping the minimum parking fee at ₹5 and ₹10 for twowheelers and four-wheelers, but added that the BPF should be doubled for on-street, peak-hour and longer parking.
Varsha Joshi, commissioner of the north Delhi municipal corporation (North MCD), said it will take a few weeks until the municipal corporations actually get to begin work on the parking fees.
“It is to be seen what the apex committee finally approves. But, the north municipal corporation will try to enforce the approved rates as effectively as possible,” she said.
The BPF committee has also suggested a maximum multiplying factor of 3 on the BPF for parking in busy areas – markets and commercial hubs — meaning these areas may have to pay thrice the usual rate.
Bhupender Gupta, Standing Committee Chairperson of the South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC), said this will not be mandatory for the urban civic bodies.
“The panel suggested that the multiplication factor based on location of the parking may be varied from 1 to 3. So, civic agencies could set the highest location-based multiplication factor as low as even 1, which means the same rate as recommended. This means even in central business districts like Nehru Place, there will be no addition in the fare based on the location,” he said.
Gupta added that while the maximum cap on the multiplication factor is 3, the civic agencies could keep the location-based multiplier at 1.5, 2 or 2.5.
RWAS SAY RATES ARE TOO HIGH
Resident welfare associations (RWAS) said they found the rates too high, but also questioned if the civic agencies would promise to upgrade pedestrian and parking infrastructure with the increased revenue collected.
“This sounds like surcharge rates as applied cab aggregator apps like Ola and Uber. The authorities must create sufficient number of parking lots and public transport services before they decide to raise parking tariffs. Also, what about infrastructure for pedestrians and cyclists,” said Atul Goyal, President, United Residents Joint Action of Delhi( URJA) , a federation of RWAS in Delhi.
“If this were to apply only during very high pollution levels, I would have understood. But such high parking rates on a daily basis will only lead to motorists parking their vehicles anywhere and ugly fights between parking boys, the police and people,” he added.
BS Vohra, President, East Delhi reidents’ welfare association Joint Front, said, “Will the MCDS and other agencies improve their enforcement activities? Cars gather dust and remain parked on arterial roads for years and yet are never moved. Will they only keep extracting tax payers’ money or will they even show some strict actions against encroachments?”