SAMBALPUR: With the management of vehicular traffic in the city worsening day by day, officials of the newly created Traffic police station have asked the Sambalpur Municipal Corporation (SMC) to identify suitable parking places. The police station was inaugurated on May 1.
Sources said with commercial structures undertaking construction upto the last limit of the land leaving no space for parking, their customers park the vehicles on the roads.
Though some shopping malls have basement parking area, they have allotted the space for commercial purpose and the district administration has failed to set things right.
The parking has assumed alarming proportion along Church Chowk-Laxmi Talkies Chowk road, Laxmi Talkies Chowk-Golebazaar Chowk and VSS Marg besides other major roads of the city.
With no scope to widen the city roads, helpless police remain indifferent to the problem resulting in regular traffic snarls. However, IIC of Sambalpur Traffic police station Siba Prasad Biswal said they have written to the officials of SMC to identify locations to be developed as parking zones. An all out effort will be made to prevent illegal parking. As per the plan, the parking zones will be maintained by the civic body.
Moreover, a proposal will be submitted to the State Government for procurement of a towing vehicle for deployment in the city, Biswal said.
Earlier, the district police had identified parking spaces at Govindtola, Dhanupali, Golebazaar and Fire Station. The Public Works Department (PWD) had developed and earmarked those spaces as parking zones. However, the zones failed to accommodate large number of vehicles. Meanwhile, locals demanded a strict enforcement of traffic rules to prevent illegal parking. The owners of commercial structures should be forced to develop basement parking area, they opined.