Is road widening for unauthorised parking?

Tirupati: It is ironical to note that several roads that were widened at a huge cost by the Municipal Corporation of Tirupati (MCT) have turned into parking lots for commercial vehicles in the city.

Two years ago, the corporation has widened roads under Master Plan Roads to ease traffic congestion in the city. Under this plan, road in Bhavani Nagar, adjacent to TTD administrative building, roads in Nawabpet, Gangamma temple road, court road, Korlagunta road and 13 other roads were widened.

Widening of Nawabpet road has become inevitable for the Corporation as Tilak road, one of the busiest roads in the pilgrim city, became heavy traffic area, causing lot of inconvenience to people. Nawabpet road was widened as an alternate route to reach railway station, central bus station and also to go to localities on the south side of the city, which is fast growing due to the manifold increase of population of the pilgrim city.

Similarly, court road also became congested due to the increase of number of vehicles, and also because the areas around the court are commercial and business centres, including Prakasam street, Beri street and Netaji Road.

It is true that roads widening reduced traffic congestion to a maximum level, much to the relief of city people. But people were soon realised that their relief was short-lived as many of the widened roads turned as parking lots.

Nawabpet road and also Bhavani Nagar road became unauthorised parking for vehicles including autos, vans, jeeps, taxies and ambulances also.

A mechanic in Nawabpet road, on condition of anonymity, said that road widening is useful not to people but commercial vehicle owners to park their vehicles. Vehicles from far of places like TTD choultries, bus stand, railway station are being parked here, thus killing the very purpose of road widening, he added.

Similarly, old Municipal road, which was also widened, near vegetable market in Tilak Road also turned as a parking lot. This area filled with banks, hospitals and gold showrooms curbs free movement of vehicles.

Sadly, banks and hospitals have no parking places. There is no parking place even for ambulances and the authorities turned blind eye to this issue.

It should be noted that Corporation Commissioner N Mourya along with town planning officers recently inspected Nawabpet roads following complaints over unauthorised parking. She directed the officials to take strict measures against the road used as unauthorised parking lot. But the authorities are still to take action, resulting in these roads continuing as parking areas, thus bringing back traffic problem.