No wonder none of the residential associations – especially those that have forced their members to park on public streets due to lack of space – are yet to approach the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) to buy parking permits.
For instance, parking your car on the main street outside your building will cost you Rs 2,310 monthly and Rs 28,105 for an entire year. For two-wheelers, the charges are Rs 870 monthly and Rs 10,585 for a whole year.
“The monthly maintenance for most flat owners averages between Rs 1,200 and Rs 2,000 per month. There must be some rationalization in rates,” said a senior AMC official when asked why the permit scheme had no takers since January 2020 – when the state government gave the policy the go-ahead.
The AMC general board approved the policy on January 29, 2020. The policy had provisioned for allotment of weekly, monthly, tri-monthly, half-yearly and yearly parking permits to any person or bulk permits for an organization for a designated plot, on-street, under over bridges and flyovers. An AMC official from the zonal office was to conduct site inspections once applications were received from a group of residential associations or commercial complexes. “The AMC has fixed fees depending on the type of vehicle and the time you are to park at the allotted space,” adds the senior AMC official.
For instance, if you own a bicycle and want to park on the street right in front of your society, you will have to pay Rs 126 per month, Rs 1,620 for a half-yearly permit and Rs 6,570 annually. Similarly, the annual parking fee for a medium-sized goods vehicle is Rs 91,250 and Rs 1.33 lakh for heavy vehicles.
The new parking policy encourages sharing of parking spaces, too. “Areas such as CG Road, Ashram Road, Paldi, and other central business districts (CBD) areas see a peak in parking demand during office hours, while demand reduces on weekends,” the policy states. It adds, “The parking spaces of office buildings, schools, banks and business parks, malls and parks also see variable use of parking space on weekdays and weekends. The disparity between supply and demand of parking space can be dealt with by sharing parking spaces.”