Other than facilitating a reduction in fares of the Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) Undertaking buses, Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) Commissioner Praveen Pardeshi’s tenure will also be marked for the decongestion plan for Mumbai by enforcing no-parking rules on five major roads on August 30. The BMC on August 31 cracked down on 45 errant motorists, netting fines of ₹1.65 lakh. The Hindu spoke to Mr. Pardeshi about his future plans. Excerpts
You have declared five arterial roads as no-parking zones. People might need alternative locations.
An alternative for parking vehicles is not a birthright. There is public transport which they can use. We are going to allow paid parking on some side roads, besides the public parking lots (PPLs).
Motorists who have been used to free parking on roadsides all these years might resist or take time to adjust to paid parking.
I feel sorry that in the last two months, we have removed 3,000 poor people from near Chamdawadi nullah and Mukhyadhyapak nullah. Why should the poor suffer if the rich cannot afford to find space to park their private cars? Why should a poor person’s home be destroyed? Road doesn’t belong to car owners. Public space cannot be taken for granted. When you park your car there, for that time, it’s your private property. What are you paying to the people who paid for that road? Since we are pushing for public transport, there is an alternative. Besides, we are implementing no-parking rules only on five roads. At least if these areas become clearer, public transport will get faster so that more people could use it.
People are very happy about slashing of BEST fares.
But that will be effective only when the roads become clear for the movement of BEST buses. Otherwise what is the use?
One indicator of the success of the new parking rules is the utilisation of 26 PPLs around which you have implemented no-parking zones. Utilisation figures have not shown a phenomenal rise.
Utilisation has gone up. The locations were not good. Now we have got a PPL in Kohinoor (Dadar). The one with mechanised parking at Bhulabhai Desai Road was dysfunctional, and we are getting it repaired.
If the locations were not good, do you think builders got an FSI bonanza despite low utility?
There is a scarcity of parking spaces. The only thing good about a PPL (constructed by a builder in lieu of FSI) is when the municipal corporation builds a parking lot, a wrong is committed. Because, we use property taxpayers’ money, 50% of whom don’t have cars, while only 10% Mumbaikars who have cars use it. When a builder constructs a PPL, at least we do not do any cross subsidisation. He gets additional FSI, but recovers the cost from flat buyers. On the other hand, if the BMC builds a garden or lays water supply lines, there is no problem since they are available to all.
So who should build car parking lots?
We should continue to discourage car ownership and the only way to do that is to price parking at its true scarcity value. Parking is a luxury, but road is not. Road is for everyone. When we allow free parking, car owners appropriate that entire space and the poor suffer. We don’t have congestion tax but we can charge heavily for parking so that people are either pushed towards using public transport or paying for their parking. We don’t have the luxury of owning a Mercedes car and get slumdwellers to pay for our parking space. That is a great injustice, and is ruining the city. Road is the single most important public space and it is appropriated by the rich.
There was a controversy over a tweet that the BMC had put out, dissuading people from filling potholes and then asking them to partner with it. The BMC had come under criticism from Twitter users.
They should not fill potholes on their own. If they want to do some work with us, we can tell them how it’s done. They can perform the job of a watchdog like informing us about such spots and monitoring work of contractors.
Your decision to deduct 50% staff salary for delays in projects has not gone down well with employees.
There will be a strong way of monitoring it (the punishment). If it was the responsibility of one person, let’s say in road construction, we would have to find fault such as not taking measures or making requisite resources available. Only then action could be taken. If other officers were found to have failed to do their job properly, they would too face music.
Wouldn’t that lead to a whole lot of inquiries?
No. When delay happens, we just need to find out why it happened. It is going to be a simple process of ascertaining the primary responsibility.
You are bringing back paver blocks on city roads, which are known for very poor performance in the past.
It (paver blocks) is a technological innovation which allows water to seep and yet maintains stability. It should not be used everywhere but in locations that are prone to waterlogging. When there are utilities underground, that is the only way as without digging the ground you can repair the utility. I never said they are to be used on entire roads. They are to be used for niche connections: remove paver, repair the pipeline, and restore the road.