Bengaluru set to resume towing drive to curb illegal parking | Bengaluru News
Bengaluru: Vehicle owners may soon face stricter action for parking in no-parking zones or abandoning vehicles on the roadside. Traffic police and the five corporations under Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) are preparing to jointly resume a towing drive against illegally parked and abandoned vehicles.According to officials, such vehicles are a major cause of traffic congestion and disruption to civic works. The issue gained attention recently when citizens questioned the quality of road-asphalting work in South city corporation, where a stretch was left unpaved as an abandoned vehicle was parked there.
A South city corporation official told TOI that despite advance notices asking residents not to park vehicles on roads during asphalting, some vehicles continued to remain parked, forcing contractors to leave those portions untouched. The incident triggered renewed discussions on the need for stricter enforcement against illegal parking. Joint enforcement planUnder the proposed arrangement, all GBA corporations will provide towing vehicles, machinery and manpower, while traffic police will handle enforcement and issue fines for violations. The revenue collected through fines will be shared with the corporations, which will use the funds to maintain towing vehicles and meet operational expenses.According to corporation commissioners, each corporation has rented two towing vehicles to begin with, and there are plans to scale up enforcement to curb illegal parking across their jurisdictions. Although the initial plan was to start strict enforcement in early Jan, the commissioners said they want to first identify and create additional parking spaces for residents before launching a full-fledged crackdown.Lokhande Snehal, additional commissioner (development), East corporation, said: “Illegal parking is causing traffic congestion and chaos on the city’s streets, and towing is necessary to address this. At the same time, we are actively exploring ways to create more parking spaces so that vehicles are not parked indiscriminately.”The commissioners of North, West, and Central corporations also said they have similar plans to curb illegal parking and streamline parking systems. Meanwhile, GBA chief Maheshwar Rao said: “There are too many vehicles on the roads causing traffic issues. GBA has the power to declare spaces where no vehicles can be parked, hence corporation commissioners can also do it. We want to now ensure this is implemented at the earliest. The corporations are already notifying the parking spaces in their corporations to facilitate adequate parking.”
