Planning to purchase a brand new automobile in Maharashtra? Higher present your parking papers first. Amid Mumbai’s spiraling site visitors and parking chaos,
Transport Minister Pratap Sarnaik mentioned that new automobile registrations will now require proof of a parking house.
The directive follows a state-level assembly on Monday aimed toward addressing the Mumbai Metropolitan Area’s (MMR) worsening parking crunch. “We is not going to register new autos if the client doesn’t have a certificates of parking house allotment from the involved civic physique,” Sarnaik was quoted as saying in an India Right now report, signaling a serious coverage shift designed to discourage haphazard automobile development in already gridlocked city areas.
To complement the transfer, the City Growth Division is drafting permissions for establishing parking plazas beneath leisure grounds—a workaround to create house in a metropolis the place each sq. foot is contested.
The brand new proposals align with world city norms, the place automobile possession is contingent on demonstrating obtainable parking.
Mumbai, with over 47 lakh registered autos, together with 14 lakh non-public automobiles, has one of many highest automobile densities per kilometer in India. But the infrastructure has barely saved tempo. Many older housing colonies lack designated parking, whereas new developments usually underprovide attributable to lenient rules. The outcome: a metropolis choked with automobiles spilling onto roads, footpaths, and each spare inch of open house.
Multi-storey public parking constructions, though constructed, stay underutilized—both too removed from industrial hubs or poorly maintained. In the meantime, lax regulation has allowed a “parking mafia” to flourish, charging arbitrary charges and infrequently commandeering public tons for personal or industrial use.
Sarnaik additionally hinted at futuristic fixes. The state is advancing plans for a pod taxi system—driverless, elevated automobiles on devoted tracks—in areas like Mira-Bhayandar and Bandra-Kurla Complicated (BKC), with potential metro linkups. “I’ve visited Vadodara, which is about to launch the world’s first commercially prepared suspended pod-car system,” he mentioned, suggesting Maharashtra could observe swimsuit.