CSMC concern over rise in traffic congestion in old city

Lokmat News Network

Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar:

Better late than never, the Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar Municipal Corporation (CSMC), to decongest traffic in the commercial areas of the old city, has geared up to develop Mechanical Multilevel Car Parking (MMCP) on its traingular-shaped parking bay at Paithan Gate area. The project will be launched on build-operate and transfer (BoT) basis.

The civic administration has floated the tender inviting the Expression of Interest (EoI) to develop the modernised parking on 1100 square metres of land bearing CTS number 13917. The traditional parking bay is operated by the municipal corporation for the past many years.

It may be noted that there are two important parking bays for the citizens visiting commercial markets in the old city. The Paithan Gate parking is restricted espcecially for the four-wheelers area, the Gulmandi parking is for the two-wheelers only. The commercial markets in the old city are at Gulmandi, Aurangpura, Kumbharwada, Rangar Galli, City Chowk, Keli Bazaar, Paithan Gate, Machhali Khadak etc. However, due to rapid urbanisation and growing population of four-wheelers (especially the cars and the jeeps) the parking space at Paithan Gate was falling short.

Sensing the importance of the issue, the Paithan Gate parking land (of 1351.60 square metres) bearing CTS number 13917 was officially registered in the name of CSMC in June 2021. Later on, the former administrator okayed the appointment of project management consultancy (PMC) between October and November 2021. The city-based PMC was pressed to draft the detailed project report (DPR). Afterwards the proposal was set aside due to technical reason, except floating of tender inviting EoI, in 2022. The response to the first call was not satisfactory. Hence the CSMC civic chief went to invite EoI for second time on January 19.