Mumbai: Ahead of the assembly elections, Mumbaikars shared their anguish over diminishing parking space in the city, caused due to the increase in infrastructure and ongoing metro work.
A senior leader of the Mumbai’s Taximen Union informed there were at least 3,000 parking spaces across the city, allotted for the kaali-peeli taxis which used to house as many as 42,000 taxies each.
These spaces have now been made out of bounds by the authorities due to the ongoing metro work. For now, they have to park their vehicls on the roadside.
“There is not adequate parking space because of which people complain about taxis being parked illegally. Also, people don’t get taxis easily because there are not many proper taxi stands,” informed Al Quadros, senior leader of the Taximen’s Union.
Moreover, there has also been an increase of at least 50 per cent in the number of auto-rickshaws registered in the four RTOs in last two years.
Umakant Jadhav, a member of the Mumbai autorickshaw union, Goregaon, informed several autorickshaws run without getting registered by the RTOs. This has caused several unauthorised autorickshaw stands as well.
“Autorickshaws have limited parking space and stands throughout the city. That there’s no adequate parking space leads autorickshaws to double park, which often gets them fined,” said Jadhav.
There is not adequate space for pedestrians to walk on the station roads of Dadar, Kandivali and Goregaon. The hawkers’ encroachment on the footpaths has increased. Often two-wheelers get on the footpaths causing inconvenience to the pedestrians.
“The hawkers’ encroachment have increased in the last few years, the sergeants and constables never tell them anything. Even the BMC people overlooks them,” said Milind Desai, a government employee and resident of Dadar.
Also along the Western Express Highway and Link Road (Malad-Andheri), the road space has narrowed, leading to illegal parking of vehicles. This has also reduced the road space, leading to traffic congestion for longer hours.
