Team-BHP - Differential Parking Fee for Bangalore

What is Differential Parking Fee ?
From what I understand in the article - Parking fees are based on the below factors:
1. Traffic flow rate as reflected in passenger car units
2. Mass transportation facilities available

For Bangalore, the city would be divided into three zones - A, B and C.
Parking fee for Zone A will be highest with the highest flow of vehicles and mass transportation facilities, whereas, Zone C with the least of both.

This looks like a welcome move by the authorities. A higher parking fee would restrict the mentality of driving a car to congested places and push for more use of mass transport, buses and metro in particular.

Hopefully this gets implemented soon in B'lore. What are your thoughts ?

SOURCE

Quote:

The city appears to be set for a differential parking system which entails higher fees in central business district areas. The quantum of the parking fees will be fixed by the 198 corporators.

In his budget speech last week, CM Siddaramaiah had announced that his government "will introduce a new parking policy in all city corporations". However, the framing of the details is likely to take time, involving as it does the legislature and the BBMP council.

But there are clear indications on what shape the policy will take. A plan approved by the state government mentions zoning localities into A, B and C categories, based on traffic flow rate as reflected in passenger car units and mass transportation facilities available there.

Zone A will comprise areas like Commercial Street and MG Road, where traffic flow is high and public transport connectivity good. Such roads will have the highest parking fee.

Zone C will comprise areas with low public transport connectivity and vehicle flow. Parking fees here will be lowest. Areas with moderate public transport accessibility will fall under Zone B, where fees will be between those in Zones A and C.

The BBMP will frame the policy in consultation with the Directorate of Urban Land Transport (DULT), which will not only determine parking modalities but also look at decongesting the city. DULT had submitted a parking policy a year ago, but the BBMP council approved it only after making many changes.

BBMP commissioner M Lakshminarayana on Monday said: "The council has to take a call whether we go ahead with a uniform parking fee or introduce differential parking based on the width of the road and vehicular movement. Ideally, we should have separate slabs. The fee has to be decided by the elected body."

I guess bringing back or increasing parking fee is not going to change the situation much on ground. If you consider areas like MG road, Brigade road, Commercial street etc the number of cars are far above the available parking space.
That means even though parking space is not available people are driving down there in car and trying to squeeze if at any available bye-lane or footpaths. You can also saw chauffeur's sitting in car waiting for either the parking space to be available or for the owners to return from shopping. Increase in parking fees will bring revenue to BBMP apart from that I don't see any much difference.
Also, if you consider just the rate of parking most of the malls has steep parking charges (you may have to pay around 50 rs for parking of around 4 hours) compared to any road side parking. That does not mean mall parking area is empty.
People are ready to pay for convenience, so increasing price is not going to deter anyone. The option should be to have a public transport which is convenient, safe and available at all times. The big 10 / G series buses were a good step in this direction I felt. Till metro is operational in all lines personally I feel traffic congestion in Bangalore is going to stay.

Looking at the packages A, B and C, I think BBMP has categorised them based on where they can make the most money, rather than which places have good public transport connectivity. For example, Commercial Street. How many buses do actually go near Commercial Street? As far as I know, the only option to reach Commercial Street by bus is to go to Shivajinagar terminus and take a bus.

Since many roads around Commercial Street (where buses are allowed to ply) are one-ways, the buses that go to Shivajinagar cannot go anywhere near Commercial Street.

Quote:

Originally Posted by rohanjf (Post 3241662)

Looking at the packages A, B and C, I think BBMP has categorised them based on where they can make the most money, rather than which places have good public transport connectivity. For example, Commercial Street. How many buses do actually go near Commercial Street? As far as I know, the only option to reach Commercial Street by bus is to go to Shivajinagar terminus and take a bus.
Since many roads around Commercial Street (where buses are allowed to ply) are one-ways, the buses that go to Shivajinagar cannot go anywhere near Commercial Street.

True !! I ask the same question. How do I reach Commercial Street from BTM ? Take a Bus, but it goes to Brigade Road junction. There is no direct connectivity between major places. Namma Metro is Hopeless. Its just a waste of money to show the Glamour of Bangalore. The real IT Corridor which generates the max revenue for the state is still neglected. Forget Metro, there isn't a proper bus stop along the IT Corridors.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ajitkommini (Post 3241781)

Parking fees might have been a deterrent at one time but people are quite used to paying higher fees than this when they park in malls for example, so I don't think it will help to reduce car traffic or congestion. It might deter long-term (entire day) parking however in busy areas like Brigade rd or Church street.

Absolutely true. We are so used to paying higher money, a 30 Rs hit won't matter to the owner of the car. I pay Rs 30 at a mall, how much difference would it make if I park it in MG Road ? No difference. Just that the chances of Team-BHP Sticker spotting would get high if I park it bang in the middle of the road. :uncontrol

I thought it was an unnecessary subsidy on the part of the government to offer free parking to car owners. So, this is a good move.

I wish they would do the rest of their job though. In addition to building out mass transport, they should start mandating the amount of parking space set aside for new commercial and residential development. Otherwise, we'll see a situation all too common for those who're familiar with HAL III stage - palatial houses and/or businesses with no parking spots and crammed up the roads.

It would help a great deal even if people used designated parking spaces instead of just stopping/parking by the roadside wherever they want to get down and shop.

Personally, I try to avoid peak hours in shopping districts (weekend evenings), and usually park my car in a designated spot (paid govt. parking areas (if available) or mall parking lots (if not), and roam around either on foot or take local transport for short distances (example: I usually park in Garuda Mall if I'm in the Brigade Road area). If I'm going to an area known for a lack of parking space, I avoid taking a personal vehicle, rather than go there and 'hope' to find parking.

Our fetish for personal door-step delivery:D is what's making our parking issues worse, on top of the already chronic lack of parking spots.

Sometimes I think the best solution to traffic and congestion is improvement of broadband internet infrastructure. Already a lot of people (myself included) have replaced a portion of our real-world activities with the online equivalent - driving to the grocery store has pretty much been eliminated for the last 4-5 months thanks to an online grocery portal, shopping for home products like furnishings etc. is the next one to go. In my previous job I used to work from home upto 4 days a week sometimes. This is the best, cheapest way to get people off the roads.

I wonder what most people do, whose offices do not have dedicated parking slots for their cars.

With the increasing numbers of people in the work force and most of them owning or driving a car, it is becoming a real troublesome thing.

We have two office facilities in our organization and each of these is in excess of 7000 sq feet. Yet, we receive only 3-4 dedicated parking slots in one facility and 5 dedicated parking slots in another.

Therefore, I have made arrangements for our office colleagues, to be able to park in a nearby mall, by having my organization pay a certain fixed amount for each slot each month.

This was in a bid to look after the interests of many of my colleagues who do own cars. I feel for them because I would not want my vehicle scratched or hurt while it is parked by some roadside.

We used to make similar arrangements even in my previous organization.

Typically, only a few Senior Management people have dedicated "named" slots but we always made sure that we had an agreement with some nearby mall, to handle the parking requirements for other colleagues etc.

What do other organizations do to overcome the parking problem?

Any inputs on this would be much appreciated indeed.

Quote:

Originally Posted by shankar.balan (Post 3599119)

What do other organizations do to overcome the parking problem?

Any inputs on this would be much appreciated indeed.

My previous organization implemented a Paid Parking system. In addition to the parking space available within the building premises/campus, they made arrangements for additional "overflow" parking space in open grounds/vacant sites nearby the building and provided a Valet Parking facility.
In addition to these measure they also introduced mini-buses/vans (monthly fees paid by employees) based on employee interest/feedback from surveys.

Quote:

Originally Posted by shankar.balan (Post 3599119)

What do other organizations do to overcome the parking problem?
Any inputs on this would be much appreciated indeed.

I work for an IT giant near Vydehi hospital in Whitefield.
My company building has about 20 parking slots for 4 wheelers and about 100 for 2 wheelers.
For additional parking, the company has rented out a vacant spot near the hospital (don't know belongs to whom), where there is a security guard manning the gates of the vacant land. The security guard allows vehicles with parking stickers only.
So on the days I arrive late to work and don't find a spot within the office building, I park my car in the field. Its about 50 mts from my office.

The only problem is, since its is open, the car gets super dusty and at the end of day turns out to be an Oven. :D