A solution to the lack of parking space surrounding the Ooty Lake will be one of the main priorities of Udhagamandalam Municipality in the coming weeks, with the road becoming gridlocked due to illegal parking over the last few days.
Local residents and officials from the Tourism Department said that the number of people visiting the Boat House had seen a steady increase over the weekend, leading to parking space at the Boat House being inadequate to accommodate the vehicles of all the visiting tourists. As a result, most tourists and visitors to the Ooty Lake and Boat House are being forced into parking their vehicles along the North Lake Road. This has affected the traffic flow on the road, with buses and heavy vehicles being unable to navigate the road freely.
A small parking lot opposite the Boat House, where private buses are parked, too has become inadequate to accommodate the extra vehicles.
Local residents and activists have called upon the Udhagamandalam Municipality to open up the parking space in Khandal Mukkonam, where the municipality has leased the parking lot, built specifically to provide extra parking space for tourist vehicles, to vehicle repair shops.
G Janardhanan, president of the Public Awareness Association, said that the North Lake Road was already pretty narrow due to encroachments, leading to a lack of space for traffic to navigate the stretch freely.
“Added to this, the fact that there is not enough parking space means that traffic comes to a halt during the peak tourism season,” said Mr. Janardhanan, who called on the municipality to open up the parking lot in Khandal to accommodate tourist vehicles.
“As the parking lot in Khandal is less than a km from the boat house, tourists can walk to the boat house from Khandal, leading to fewer vehicles on the road,” said Mr. Janardhanan.