Roadside parking in Cuttack. Pictures by Badrika Nath Das

Cuttack, Sept. 1: The delay on part of the municipal corporation to come up with adequate parking space for vehicles is resulting in traffic jams in various parts of the city.

The problem is likely to assume serious proportions soon with the festive season, which starts with Ganesh Chaturthi next month.

“Finding a place to park one’s car has always remained a big problem for commuters. The problem becomes worse during the festive season because there is an unprecedented rush on the city roads,” said Sudhakar Sahu, 56, a retired government employee, adding that only a few commercial and market areas of the city had parking provisions.

Though the civic body has 20 parking lots in various parts of the city, it is yet to complete necessary groundwork for arranging 21 more such facility.

The proposal for setting up 21 more parking lots were finalised during a joint survey conducted by the Cuttack Municipal Corporation and police officials in 2011.

“The existing parking facilities have also failed to serve the purpose because of the lack of proper infrastructure including lights. As a result, people are reluctant to park vehicles at these parking lots,” said Umakant Das, a resident of Tulsipur.

Because of the absence of parking lots in various areas, people are forced to park their vehicles on the road, which, at times, create problems in the smooth flow of traffic. This happens in areas such as Pithapur, Haripur, Ranihat, Dolmundai and Seikh Bazaar.

There has been a significant rise in the number of two and four-wheeler registrations over the past couple of years.

Regional transport office data indicates that around 42,000 new two-wheelers were registered till July in 2012-13. The number was 39,702 in 2011-12.

Civic sources said the delay in setting up the proposed parking lots was mainly because of poor co-ordination among various departments and absence of land clearance.

However, civic officials said steps were being taken to have new parking lots.

“We have already asked the collector to issue necessary approval for setting up 19 of the 21 proposed parking lots. The work will begin shortly,” said Cuttack Municipal Corporation commissioner Nihar Ranjan Mohapatra.

The work on infrastructure is likely to begin within 15 days and various parking-related problems of the commuters is likely to be resolved before Dussehra.