Clamping wheels, locking two-wheelers with chains, and imposing fine on vehicles seem to have hardly any impact on persons parking their vehicles in ‘No Parking’ zones in the city. Vehicles parked on the roadside in congested areas, especially in commercial hubs, has narrowed the space on roads that can be used by motorists and pedestrians.
“Two-wheelers are parked under No Parking boards and four-wheelers are parked at areas earmarked for parking two-wheelers. Such violations choke areas such as the Court Road,” former president of Coimbatore District Small Industries’ Association J. Balu said. He wonders at the inaction of police who frequent that stretch.
Parking and No Parking zones are marked after calculating traffic congestion that could be caused in the particular place. In an effort to avoid congestion, parking is not permitted for a distance of 50 metres from junctions and it gives enough room for vehicles to take a turn. There are quite a few places, such as Oppanakara Street, where the city police are trying out systems to avoid parking on either side of the road. But co-operation for the same is a big question.
Senior police officers say that the No Parking boards will be meaningless unless there is co-operation from the public. Be it cars or bikes, the maximum fine for parking rule violators is a mere Rs. 100. Field level officers recalled incidents when they imposed a fine on no parking offenders and moved to another area, only to find more motorists parking their vehicles at the other end of the road from where they had collected penalty only a few minutes ago. Police personnel express the need for amendments to be made in the motor vehicle rules with provision to initiate stringent action or impose heavier fines on offenders who park vehicles in the places where they are not supposed to do so.
On the other hand, there is an allegation that action is taken against vehicles parked in no parking zones only in select places and that the offenders go unpunished at quite a few important locations in the city. The police have no concrete answer on why they have not initiated action at such places.
(Reporting by
M.K. Ananth)
