Review parking charges by Sept 30: CAQM to agencies

In a bid to encourage the use of public transport in Delhi and reduce air pollution, the Commission for Air Quality Management in NCR and Adjoining Region (CAQM) has directed urban bodies in the city to “review” and “rationalise” parking fee of private vehicles by September end.
The move will bring a uniform parking fee structure in the city, which will have surges based on the time of the day and the prevailing congestion in an area, according to CAQM.
Experts and stakeholders, however, have said that the move is likely to lead to a significant increase in parking rates in the city, particularly in rush hours and high-density areas like markets and office spaces from October.
“The commission, under Section 12 of the CAQM Act, 2021, hereby directs the urban local bodies in Delhi to comprehensively review and rationalise the parking charges for private vehicles in their respective jurisdictions and complete the exercise latest by September 30, based on the review of local area – specific integrated parking management plans and associated pricing strategies,” said CAQM said in its August 20 order shared on Thursday.
This revision in parking fee needs to implemented by September 30 in Delhi and disseminated to the public widely, it added.
This is the second time that CAQM has issued similar directions. In April, it had asked to rationalise the parking charges by August 30.
The direction, which is expected discourage the use of private vehicles on the roads, is a part of efforts to make the city’s air cleaner by way of reducing vehicular emissions. “The ever-growing fleet of private vehicles in Delhi-NCR has been a prime contributor to vehicular emissions and that such large number of private vehicles also cause traffic congestions and jams,” CAQM said in its order.
Delhi, that has the notorious distinction of being the most polluted Capital in the world, gets engulfed in toxic haze particularly at the onset of winter every year.
Cleaner public transport options like the Delhi Metro or electric buses will help reduce air pollution and multiple meetings have been held from time-to-time to encourage clean public transport and hike fees for private vehicles, the order further stated.
CAQM said that the last exercise of fixing parking charges was carried out several years ago. “At the same time, despite issuing directions in previous meetings, the latest of which was April 24, such an exercise had still not been carried out yet, except during stage-2 of the Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) and briefly in NDMC’s (New Delhi Municipal Corporation) jurisdiction last year,” the commission said.
An MCD official said a proposal in this regard has already been prepared, however, it is yet to be cleared in the house of councillors. “The same is pending for consideration and approval of the corporation in the house.”
Anumita Roychowdhury, executive director, research and advocacy at Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) said the parking pricing norms need to be implemented alongside parking management area plans, previously directed by CAQM.
“All municipalities need to implement these directions at a ward-level as isolation in some commercial areas will not work. In theory, the pricing will be based on importance of the place, the time of the day and the charges should increase with duration of the parking time period,” said Roychowdhury, stating this is what needed to be defined by the municipal bodies.
Amit Bhatt, managing director (India), International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) said increasing parking charges alone will not work, as Delhi needs parking area management plans too. At the same time, he said incentives for cleaner options were required. “We also need to either reduce charges for zero-emission vehicles or making parking free for them. This then incentivises a shift to cleaner fuels too,” he said.
A CAQM official said the rates are likely to go up in some parts of the city and drop in some places, in a bid to make them uniform.