No Parking

NO PARKING
If the traffic is chaotic and stress-inducing, parking is even more so. BT drives around the busiest roads in the city to check out how they measure up
The TImes of India

MG Road
The first half from Trinity Circle has zero or limited parking. There are a few shops, banks and stores, most have their own parking spaces. The parking around a major movie theatre is full at all times. The main shopping stretch has a long parking space in front of it, all occupied. But it’s orderly, probably because of the traffic cops and Hoysala standing by. But there’s not a single parking space vacant, down the entire length of the road from Brigade Road to St Mark’s Road junction. Those looking for a space have to circle the block.
Church Street

Truly a mega mess. There’s never any parking easily available, and from midday onwards it gets really bad. There’s no pavement, and cars and motorbikes are all parked in a jumble, wherever space gets free. Ask the parking attendant about the number of parking spaces available, and he confidently says 1,000. But it’s more like 120. The large number of eating places adds to the congestion. Cars slow down for people to alight, creating a jam.

80 Feet Road, Koramangala

The ultimate parking nightmare. Full of arcades, shopping malls, supermarkets, and banks, it has no parking system whatsoever. Where pavements exist, stores and banks have cordoned these off for their own parking. In front of a popular supermarket, cars and bikes are parked haphazardly. A vehicle reversing onto the road from the pavement outside a supermarket almost knocks down a walker, who’s trying to skirt the rubble piled there. “Shops and companies have taken over pavement spaces for their own parking,” says Koramangala resident Sunil Chainani, “People drive slowly, looking for parking, so it takes forever to enter or exit Koramangala. The pavement parking reduces the road width, creating further jams. Outside a mega mall, there are at least 10 autos parked openly in a no parking zone, but no action is ever taken.” This virtually reduces the road by an entire lane’s width. “It’s a double whammy,” he adds, “Besides the hassles the haphazard parking creates, you can’t even walk because the pavements are full of cars and bikes.” In many residential side lanes, like fifth block, people park in front of no parking signs, and no action is ever taken by the police, he says.

CMH Road, Indiranagar

Saturday evening, and the road is jammed with cars trying to back in the limited parking spaces available. Shops, eating places and coffee shops are full of customers, but ask the cashier of a popular chaat house if his customers face any parking problems and he denies it. There’s a lone Hoysala trying to round up wrongly-parked cars. Says Indiranagar resident Babi Dey, “The problem is worse because people are now parking in the side lanes, blocking residential areas. Residents should be allotted reserved parking slots, as in other major cities of the world. This will prevent blockage. Also, a pay and park system like Brigade Road will help. We won’t have to deal with the parking attendants, who never look after the cars, anyway.”

Commercial Street


The cars lined up along Kamaraj Road is an indication of what Commercial Street holds in store. Never mind finding parking on a Saturday evening, it takes over 25 minutes to circle the street. At the end of it, there’s still no parking available. In spite of the slightly bemused looking cops trying to direct the traffic, people stop their cars on the wrong side, and finish a quick bit of shopping. “It’s very bad in the evenings, especially on Saturdays and Sundays,” says the cashier at a sports shop.

Shopping mall

While the mall can accommodate 300 cars and 150 motorbikes, it has begun charging Rs 50 per car and Rs 20 per bike for parking, which has thinned out the traffic jam which would occur especially on weekends in this busy part of central Bangalore. Pooja C, a software engineer, finds this fee has made the parking process simpler. “Earlier there used to be frequent traffic jams here because people would come here and not buy anything. This parking fee is a deterrent to those who just come here to hang out.”