Mumbai: BMC failed to utilise parking lots in Khar, Bandra, say residents

The BMC plans to construct a parking lot below Patwardhan Garden with a capacity of 780 vehicles (four-wheelers and two-wheelers). The underground parking will have a three-level basement and one upper floor, atop which the garden will be redeveloped. Residents have raised objections over the proposed reduction in the area of the garden once the construction is complete, from the current area of 14,500 sqm.

A resident of Khar, activist Zoru Bhathena, who filed the RTI, said at least seven parking lots, with a capacity of 300-350 vehicles each, in Khar and Bandra are underutilised, including some that are shut.

He told The Indian Express: “The BMC’s logic to construct an underground parking at Patwardhan Park is that parking on the roads will be less. But I have found at least seven parking lots in Bandra and Khar area that are not utilised. Why is the civic body not creating a mechanism to use these?”

He added that the proposed underground parking will destroy the green space at Patwardhan Park. “There is a problem in the civic body’s execution and planning and there is no thought behind proposing new construction,” he said.

The seven parking lots, all on private premises, are near Bal Gandharva Rang Mandir Auditorium, Crystal Mall, Link Square Mall, Kenilworth Mall, Link Corner Mall, N M Medical Centre Building and Shoppers Stop on Linking Road. Bhathena visited the parking lots. While one was found to be shut, others were largely empty, he claimed.

Assistant Municipal Commissioner, H-West, Sharad Ughade, said: “We will have to examine what kind of parking spaces these are. If they are on private premises then there will be very limited access. There must be some issue because of which they are not used. The Patwardhan Park parking lot can be used by anybody.”