An apartment block under construction with parking space. Picture by UB Photos

Oct. 27: Promoters of multi-storeyed residential buildings in the city will have to provide two parking slots for each apartment if a new legislation is passed.

The Guwahati Metropolitan Development Authority (GMDA) and Guwahati Municipal Corporation (GMC) are ready with a draft proposal, which envisages one additional parking space for a guest for each occupant of a building.

The proposal will be submitted to the government soon.

Official sources said Dispur recently constituted a committee headed by chief executive officer of the GMDA, D. Haraprasad, to come up with new parking rules and regulations for multi-storeyed apartments and commercial buildings.

?The existing multi-storeyed apartments have parking provision only for the residents. Whenever guests or other visitors come to the apartments, they park their vehicles on the roads creating traffic snarls,? a member of the committee said.

He pointed out that often the guests stay for a long time, aggravating the problem.

The proposed legislation comes at a time when city police have identified some buildings, which were found to be violating parking norms.

The list of the errant apartments has been forwarded to the GMDA and the GMC for taking corrective measures.

The committee formed to decide parking rules also comprises director, country and town planning D.B. Sarma, GMDA town planner Dalim Gogoi and GMC town planner Nivedita Hazarika.

During its recent two meetings, the committee also discussed in detail as to how to regulate construction of multi-storeyed commercial complexes, which often violate parking norms.

A member of the committee said while new rules and regulations would be stipulated for new buildings, corrective measures would be recommended for the existing ones, which do not have adequate parking spaces.

He said the committee, besides looking into parking rules, is also delving into the issue of regulating the real estate business in the city.

A separate set of rules in this regard will also be chalked out for the hotels.

More than 80 per cent of hotels and multi-storeyed buildings in the city do not have their own parking accommodation.

Sources said many owners of hotels and multi-storeyed buildings had converted their parking spaces into small shopping plazas.

The gravity of the problem can be easily gauged from the fact the police have been realising a substantial amount as fine from vehicle owners for parking rule violations in front of various apartments.

The police collect more than Rs 40,000 as fine everyday for violation of traffic norms in the city.