New challenges await Coimbatore Corporation on D.B. Road
Parking should be regulated, space for vendors needs a relook
As the Coimbatore Corporation looks at a February 28 deadline to throw open to traffic the D.B. Road in R.S. Puram, it is set to face challenges, some of which are those it set out to address before executing the model road project.
The Corporation under the Smart Cities Mission has taken up work to redesign the 1.80 km road at ₹ 24.36 crore by providing utility ducts, widened platforms and other pedestrian-friendly facility. The civic body that was supposed to have completed the project in four to six months in 2017, suspended it and resumed work with a new design in 2018.
The challenges that the Corporation is set to face are evident in that stretch of the road where it had completed work and thrown it open to traffic. The first of those is parking. In the absence of regulation, road users continue to park vehicles, both two-wheelers and four-wheelers, the way they did prior to the start of the model road project.
With the carriage way reduced to 14m, the space available for vehicle movement has reduced as parking is unregulated, says a road user. The absence of regulation is also hindering the movement of customers, and carrying of goods to shops rues a shopkeeper.
As per the model road project proposal, the Corporation is supposed to provide on-street parking by clearly delineating parking space.
And, road users are supposed to park vehicles parallel to the street.
The shopkeeper says it remains to be seen if the monthly alternate parking system will return to D.B. Road after the Corporation completes the work.
Another issue that sources say the Corporation has not addressed is that of street vendors. Though the Corporation has built the pavements wide enough to accommodate street vendors, it has not earmarked space for them to do business and this in itself could lead to encroachment of the pavement, fear the shopkeepers on the Road.
Consumer activist K. Kathirmathiyon says the benefit of the ₹ 24.36 crore investment the Corporation has made depends on its ability to work closely with the Coimbatore City Traffic Police to regulate traffic and parking and prevent encroachment of pavements.
If the Corporation failed to regulate street vendors, it will result in a situation where shopkeepers will encroach upon the space in front of their establishments, the street vendors the other side of the pavements, forcing pedestrians on to the road.
This will be undoing of the project, he says.
Parking should be regulated, space for vendors needs a relook
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