Limit parking lots to ground plus four floors: UD

According to a letter written to Municipal Commissioner Subodh Kumar by Principal Secretary of the Urban Development Department T C Benjamin,the BMC will also now have to submit a proposal to amend the public parking FSI regulation by including these suggestions.

The state government has also directed that a masterplan be created for new public parking lots with due regard for where they are actually required in the city.

Under DC Rule 33(24),new constructions on a plot of over 1,000 sq mts in the island city and over 2,000 sq mts in the suburbs can get FSI of up to four if the developer constructs over 50 parking lots and hands them over to the BMC. Following this,many builders had come forward to avail the extra FSI.

Proposals for 20,000 parking lots were approved in the commercially lucrative Lower Parel-Worli area. Several dozen skyscrapers were proposed in the Lower Parel and Worli belt of Central Mumbai by developers soon after the introduction of the DC Rule 33 (24) in 2008.

The government had amended the development control regulations to permit private participation in public parking. Following which,a private party could avail up to 50 per cent of the built-up area of the public parking space constructed on the plot. The parking facility,once created,had to be handed over free-of-cost to the BMC.

Builders who have availed of the parking FSI include Lodha Developer’s World One at Srinivas Mills and Lodha Excelus at Apollo mills,Indiabulls Skysuites and Indiabulls Finance Centre at Jupiter and Elphinstone mills respectively,DLF’s project at Mumbai Textile Mills and a project by K Raheja Universal at Worli and two others by DB Realty at Byculla and Mahim.

“We have received directives from the state government and are in the process of proposing the change in the public parking regulations 33(24). But we have proposed the amendments with certain changes and suggestions. The draft will now go to the municipal commissioner for approval,following which it will be sent to the state government,” said Aseem Gupta,Additional Municipal Commissioner.

Recently,the state government had decided to put on hold any further permissions for parking FSI in the island city due to fears of overcrowding and inadequate infrastructure for the mushrooming skyscrapers. The UD Department had also mooted a proposal to scrap the parking FSI policy.