Eastern Mirror Desk
Dimapur, March 6: Dimapur Municipal Council (DMC) along with the district administration, deputy commissioner of police (traffic) and transport authority have stood by the decision to “move ahead” with charging INR 10 per hour along the Nyamo Lotha Road as parking fees beginning from March 10.
DMC administrator, Moa Sangtam, told Eastern Mirror that the transport authority, the district administration, DCP (traffic) and the DMC have come up with an eight point clarifications after the Nyamo Lotha Road Business Association (NLRBA) issued a statement opposing the taxation.
“In the end the people have to decide whether to look at the welfare of a few business people or look at the welfare of the public,” said Sangtam.
He said that the decision lies with the Regional Transport Authority (RTA) and not DMC in the first place.
While NLRBA argued that the shop owners would be charged an amount of INR 120-150 as parking fees on a single day, Sangtam made known that this practice “deprives the public” of parking space adding that this is one issue the DMC wants to tackle.
“The main objective behind this move is to ensure more parking spaces for the public. Everyday around 30-40 vehicle spaces are taken over by the vehicles of the shop owners who keep it parked the whole day,” said Sangtam. He hoped that imposing parking fees would make them reconsider the practice.
Sangtam also informed that as part of the eight points clarification, DMC would be deploying 30 staff everyday to ensure that people park their vehicle properly (this will result in more parking space for vehicles keeping in mind the ever increasing number of vehicles in Dimapur) and also to ensure the safety of the vehicles.
Sangtam reiterated that the fees collected would be transparent to the public and “anyone can come to the office of the DMC” to check while informing that the fees collected would be used to maintain the Nyamo Lotha Road.
“The move aims to improve better traffic flow at the particular location since it is one of the most congested, taking into consideration the number of people (30 DMC staff) to oversee the implementation of the said move.”
The administrator also informed that no fees would be imposed for those who park for less than 10 minutes which includes parents who drop and pick their children from school. “This will ensure that parking space will be made available for those who want to park longer,” he said.
Sangtam appealed to the concerned citizens of Dimapur to first see how this move works out and give their opinion after the system is in place for a few months.
“The immediate implementation was not possible after the notification was issued as road markings for parking were needed and machines took time to arrive,” Sangtam informed.
Earlier, NLRBA appealed to the Dimapur transport authority to cancel the notification but to no avail. NLRBA had stated that levying parking tax would discourage shoppers to make a stopover along the stretch for shopping purposes.
“Additionally, the shop owners who park their vehicle for the whole day will have to shell out INR 120-150 on daily basis. Nyamo Lotha Road is not the only road with heavy vehicular movement and haphazard parking. So why levy parking tax only in that particular stretch?,” stated the press release from the general secretary of NLRBA.
Stating that the move to levy parking tax appeared to target only the business activity at Nyamo Lotha road, NLRBA made its stand clear that the association would be compel to down shutters in the event parking tax is levied along the stretch.
