Many commercial vehicles are parked in the interior roads of the locality. L. KANTHIMATHI reports
Along with his neighbours, Balaji Venkatesan takes a walk on the interior roads of Raghavan Colony and makes note of the registration numbers of vehicles parked in the locality. Then, they get the name and phone number of each of these vehicle owners through Vahan, a register maintained by Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (https://vahan.nic.in/nrservices/).
Next, they make a call to the owners and ask them to remove their vehicles. If they don't, these residents call the traffic police. They have been doing this for the last three years.
Raghavan Colony Welfare Association resorted to this extreme measure as taxis, vans abandoned vehicles are parked in alarming numbers the interior lanes of the locality. Residents complain that these roads, already narrow have reduced further in girth, and pavements have also become inaccessible due to these parked vehicles.
Most of the owners of these vehicles live in nearby neighbourhoods including Jhafferkhanpet, VSM Garden Street, Thiruvalluvar Street, Vadivel Street and R.V. Nagar, say residents.
N. Seenivasan, a resident of Raghavan Colony Second Street, cites an incident that happened eight months ago in which one of his neighbours had to be rushed to the hospital as his breathing was laboured.
"This happened at midnight. A van had been parked in front of his gate and the family was not able to take their car out. All of them, including the person who had to be taken to the hospital, had to climb over the compound wall; and we took them in our car," he says.
A resident of Raghavan Colony West Street, K. Venkataraman, says as the streets are poorly illuminated, unlawful activities take place near these vehicles at night. "Moreover, there is a mechanic shop close by and vehicles from there are also parked here," adds Venkataraman.
Residents pointed out another incident where a transformer got burst and power supply was suspended and though the linemen had come to attend to the problem, they were not able to start their work as a van was hindering access to the transformer.
The Association plans to paste labels to identify those vehicles which belong to the residents.
"Also, with the permission of the traffic police, the Association will paste posters on vehicles of non-residents requesting them not to park their vehicles here. Also, we will be requesting the police to barricade a portion of the road and install 'no-parking' sign boards and tow away vehicles that violate the rule."
