Coastal road, Metro cost city its 12 on-street spaces

While one of them at Bhulabhai Desai road at Breach Candy was closed due to the ongoing coastal road construction at Amarsons Park, the one inside the traffic island opposite Eros Cinema at Churchgate and the one at Hutatma Chowk were closed due to the ongoing Metro work.

From coastal road work to metro construction or recommendation from the traffic police, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has lost 12 on-street parking lots to various reasons in the past few years.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has lost 12 on-street parking lots to various reasons in the past few years. (Pratik Chorge/HT Photo)

In June, the BMC dropped 12 on-street parking lots from its original list of 91. While one of them at Bhulabhai Desai road at Breach Candy was closed due to the ongoing coastal road construction at Amarsons Park, the one inside the traffic island opposite Eros Cinema at Churchgate and the one at Hutatma Chowk were closed due to the ongoing Metro work. The one at Senapati Bapat Road at Lower Parel, one at Ganpat Rao Kadam Marg at Lower Parel, one at JRD Tata road at Churchgate, and the one near Famous studio at Worli were closed due to recommendations from the traffic police.

Four other on-street parking lots, two at Pandurang Budhkar Marg at Lower Parel, one at Hind Cycle near Worli, and at Sudam Ahire Marg at Worli were closed, as they fall within 500m of a public parking lot. The 12th on-street parking lot, at Khodadad Circle at Dadar, was closed following a high court order barring parking under a flyover.

Civic commissioner Praveen Pardeshi said, “These 12 sites of on-street parking lots, which are closed now, had very few parking spaces, so it will not make much of a difference to the city’s total parking space. They were closed after studying traffic congestion and subsequent directions from the traffic police. As for the once closed due to coastal road and metro construction, they will be reopened after the construction is over.”