The Raja Annamalai Puram Residents’Association has come up with an action plan to deal with the issue of haphazard parking in a section of the locality. It cannot execute this plan, but only offer it to the Chennai Corporation for consideration.
At a recent meeting among a few RAPRA members, it was suggested that a walkers’ path and an earmarked parking slot could be developed on the carriageway between Hotel Sangeetha and Billroth Hospital on Third Cross Street, Raja Annamalai Puram.
The thoroughfare has enough space to accommodate footpaths and a parking space. On both sides, the civic body has constructed complexes and let them out to commercial establishments.
Vehicles coming to the establishments are parked indiscriminately, preventing pedestrians from using the well-laid walker’s path.
Speaking about the concept, Dr. R. Chandrasekaran, founder, RAPRA, said, “The civic body can develop a basement parking system connecting these commercial complexes. The parking slot can accommodate around 300 cars. Railings with footpaths can be built for pedestrians.”
It is not just pedestrians who suffer from haphazard parking here. Car drivers are put to inconvenience while trying to take a u-turn.
“The complexes can be rebuilt and renovated in stages without affecting the traders. A lot of commercial space is lying vacant there. Till the work on construction of the basement parking slot is completed, the traders can be relocated in the vacant space,” he pointed out.
There have been other suggestions, including the one from K.T.A. Sharma, a resident of Fourth Main Road, R.A. Puram, who bats for terrace parking.
“Construction of a basement parking slot would involve relocation of traders and lead to traffic snarls. There is a gap between footpaths and the road, which can be developed as a parking slot. The parking slot is used by a finance company to park the vehicles seized from owners who had not paid their dues. Terrace parking slot will be an easy way out of the problem,” he says.
K. V. Rajan, a resident of R. A. Puram, said, ‘Important factors such as the flow of vehicular traffic on the stretch, the costs and the space required for constructing a basement parking slot should be taken into consideration.”
“The basement parking facility will generate income for the civic body, which will sustain the costs involved in constructing footpaths. On one side, two-wheelers can be parked, and on the other, cars,” S. Ramanathan said.
Mmbers said that if it came up, the Terrace Parking System should be maintained on a Public-Private-Partnership. The parking slot would be a model project for the city, said G. Nagarajan and A. Lakshmi Venkatesh.
Apart from this, RAPRA members also want medians and speed-breakers to be constructed on Third Cross Street.
