People in Dhaka will now be lawfully allowed to park their cars on designated streets and get relieved from parking hassles. Traffic Department of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) yesterday published as many as 39 on-street car parking spots in the capital, reports UNB.

The DMP came up with the arrangement with an aim to reduce the traffic congestion in Dhaka city and also to facilitate car parking of city dwellers, said a senior DMP official. Contacted, Additional Commissioner (Traffic) of the DMP Mir Rezaul Alam told UNB that they have already sent the lists of on-street car parking areas to Dhaka North City Corporation (DNCC) and Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC). "They will fix charge of on-street car parking," he said.

Chief Estate Officer of the DNCC Aminul Islam said they already got a list of 32 on-street car parking spots from the traffic department of the DMP. "We already started process to lease out those spots for collecting parking charge," he said. A committee has already formed in this regard. After fixing parking charge, the DNCC would go for tender bid, he said.

Chief Estate Officer of the DSCC Kamrul Islam Chowdhury said they got list of 7 on-street parking areas under the corporation from the DMP traffic department.

"We already started process of fixing car parking charge of those areas through a committee," he said. Replying to a question, he said the DSCC has been collecting car-parking charge in several areas. After completion of all formalities, "we will go for tender for lease out of on-street car parking areas."

Replying to a question, he said Criminal Investigation Department (CID) formally sought permission from the DSCC for using road under the Mouchak Flyover in front of the CID headquarters of Malibagh. "We already gave consent to use those area for car parking," he said.

Car parking of other areas under the entire Moghbazar-Mopuchak Flyover are illegal, the DSCC Chief Estate Officer said.

Talking to UNB, Prof Nazrul Islam, a renowned urban expert, said the decision of identifying on-street car parking areas is a good idea.

On-street and off-street car parking are must for a planned city as the modern cities like New York and Paris have those facilities. The DMP's decision to identify on-street car parking is a better solution than having no solution of Dhaka's parking problem, he said.

But they should be careful to identify on-street car parking on the streets, where mass transports, that means passenger buses are plying, he cautioned. The decision of on-street car parking would reduce unnecessarily harassment of car users by the traffic police, Prof Nazrul said.

Mojibur Rahman, managing director of a private company said the DMP's announcement of on-street parking is a good decision for the vehicles, especially self-driven car. The decision would reduce traffic harassment, Mojjbur Rahman, who go to his Uttara office from Mirpur-7 regularly by self-driven car.