Pros and cons of the Pettah Floating Market

The Pettah Floating Market is one of Colombo’s newer landmarks opened to the public in 2014, located at the Bastian Mawatha on the Beira Lake. The Pettah Floating Market featured nearly a hundred stalls and shops selling a variety of items ranging from lo

When the Daily Mirror visited the floating market and spoke to a few vendors. Here are some of the opinions aired by them.

In the first series of the Floating Market space, we could see a nice stretch of fruit stalls, and also a few fruit and vegetable stalls filled with customers, mostly young couples.

But, in the next phase, there were empty stores with a number of “For Rent” notices nailed in front of it. However, some stores were legitimately floating next to the market, lazily cruising through while the sellers seemed to be asleep.

Speaking to Daily Mirror, a vendor under conditions of anonymity said they were yet in businesses after numerous attempts with the Urban Develop Authority (UDA) to find a solution to their problems. The vendor, a seller of baby dolls and other knick- knacks said they had even taken to the street in protest.

“We urged the UDA authorities to do something as our business is going down day-by-day. But it all fell on deaf ears. Now the vendors from “Kelepola” are using these empty stores to stock their food items without making any payments to the UDA,” he said. As he claimed, we also noticed some wooden boxes piled up with food items at the floating boats (stores).

Another seller, K. D. Pathmini, a resident from Polonnaruwa said that, at the moment all they wanted was a Bridge between the Floating Market and the main road. If the Bridge is opened, the visitors will be able to come to the stalls. But the current situation is, the visitors have to go around the street to come to floating stalls, and according to the sellers, that is the reason for the declining of their business.

Kalyani, an Achcharu seller from the Kelaniya area had a completely different outlook when compared to her counterparts. “We were given very nice and valuable places to continue our business activities in the heart of Colombo. So, it is up to us to maintain our business by any means. To be frank with you, I have got no problem in running myAchcharu business,” Kalyani said.

“They established a boat service for the visitors enabling them to drive towards our stalls. The UDAcannot give our fate to our hands, can they?” she exclaimed.

In the row of stores, there were shops containing dry foods such as dhal, rice and milk powder.Ayoung boy loitering in the area said the customers rarely visited their stores, and as they had no option, they are staying at the market.

However, because we visited the Floating Market and spoke with the vendors, we felt the place is not being properly utilized by the vendors and they have not guided by the UDAauthorities as to how to capitalize on it. The market place is situated in the heart of Colombo where most of the people pass through everyday.Therefore, the UDA is responsible to look into this matter, give solutions to the vendors to uplift their business better and find strategies to develop the current situation in the Pettah Floating Market.