After B&E, PMC to hand over to Pune Metro J M Road mechanised parking lot
t was after beginning operations on the Vanaz-Ramwadi route that the Pune Metro asked the PMC to hand over the parking lot on a revenue sharing basis in 2022
PUNE: After a thief broke into an unused mechanised parking lot on Janglee Maharaj (J M) Road and managed to evade arrest despite the police giving chase and the fire brigade called in to help, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has relented to the Pune Metro’s demand for the parking lot. The PMC will soon draft a proposal and submit it to the standing committee for approval.
It was after beginning operations on the Vanaz-Ramwadi route that the Pune Metro asked the PMC to hand over the parking lot on a revenue sharing basis in 2022. After more than a year, the PMC has taken cognisance of the Pune Metro’s demand.
Shrinivas Bonala, chief engineer of the project department, PMC, said, “We received a letter from the Pune Metro to hand over the parking lot on a revenue sharing basis. They mentioned the 80:20 formula for revenue sharing. We have decided to put up the proposal in the standing committee meeting. We will hand over the existing parking to the Pune Metro. The latter will use the mechanised parking for commuters and carry out necessary maintenance. The J M Road mechanised parking lot has not been in use since the Covid-19 pandemic.”
Hemant Sonawane, executive director of the public relations and administration department of the Pune Metro, said, “We have written a letter to the PMC to hand over the J M Road parking to Pune Metro. We are waiting for the PMC’s decision. We have asked for the parking lot due to lack of parking space.”
J M Road is one of the busiest roads in Pune. In 2007, the PMC designed a 20-storeyed mechanised vertical parking lot (accommodating 80 cars) to solve the parking problem. The corporation spent ₹2.4 crore on the ambitious project which took nearly two years to complete. However, the project did not meet with much success due to easy availability of parking on J M Road. Till 2012, a private contractor ran the J M Road mechanised parking after which no contractor came forward. In 2015, the then additional municipal commissioner Om Prakash Bakoria sealed off the space as it was illegally used by Sai Service Station Limited, a private vehicle dealer.
Whereas for the Pune Metro, inadequate parking for commuters’ vehicles had always been a problem ever since the service started on March 6, 2022. Hence, the Pune Metro decided to use the PMC’s unused mechanised parking on J M Road. The Pune Metro wrote a letter to the PMC and urged the latter to hand over the parking lot on a revenue sharing basis. The PMC finally took cognisance of the Pune Metro’s demand. That too after a thief broke into the mechanised parking lot on June 22. The police gave chase but the thief climbed up a building in the parking lot. The police had to negotiate with the thief to come down. The fire brigade was called in to help and a large crowd gathered but the thief got away.
