Circular Road reduced to ‘free parking zone’ in Jammu

Once an easy escape route from Jammu city to reach the Jammu-Srinagar national highway, the single-lane Circular Road from the Deputy Commissioner (DC) office to Panjtirthi, has now been reduced to a free-parking zone.

Circular Road reduced to ‘free parking zone’The Jammu and Kashmir Government has no plans to address the issue and make space available to people for parking of their vehicles.

In the absence of parking lots and rising number of vehicles the road has been virtually turned into a parking zone. Daily hundreds of vehicles are parked on the road and the traffic police is not bothered about it till the time any VIP passes through the area. At that time, vehicles are lifted and fine is imposed on people for wrong parking.

The matter is worse as during night thieves either take away vehicles or steal tyres of vehicles. The single-lane Circular Road was being used by people to get an easy access to the Jammu-Srinagar national highway near the Sidhra bridge, but due to parking of vehicles, traffic movement has become very difficult.

“We have no other option, but to park our vehicles near the DC office, that, too, on our own risk. Localities are so congested that no vehicle can enter narrow lanes and the government has also not provided any place for parking,” said Ramesh Kumar, a resident of the Dalpatian area, near the DC office.

The Urban Development Department of the state government has to look after the needs of Jammu city and providing parking lots also is the responsibility of the department. But the Jammu Municipal Corporation (JMC), a wing of the Urban Development Department, which looks after Jammu city, has no plans to build any parking lot in the area.

“Neither do we any land available for building any parking area, nor does the government has any plan to acquire land. To build any infrastructure, we will have to acquire land from residents and that will be a lengthy process,” said Anil Kumar Raina, Chief Town Planner, JMC.

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