Space aplenty: One down, five rotary parking spaces coming up

LePark launches first automated system in busiest commercial hub

LAHORE: Keeping up with modern times and needs, the Lahore Parking Company (LePark) has decided to install five more automatic rotary parking systems in the provincial capital.

The company officially started the first such automated system in the busiest commercial hub of Lahore of Ichra on Ferozepur Road on Saturday and has already initiated the process to install five more such facilities.

Two of these will be installed on Jail Road near the Punjab Institute of Cardiology and three more in Ichra, LePark Acting CEO Usman Qayyum told The Express Tribune. The company has also floated tender for procurement of five new rotary parking machines.

The automatic rotary parking system, he added, will help reduce parking and traffic problems. “The beauty of the innovative system is that 12 cars can be parked in the space of two vehicles,” Usman said.

LePark has installed the first rotary parking system at a cost of Rs12.5 million, excluding the expenditure on civil works and diesel generator sets needed for uninterrupted power supply. “The company has imported the complete system from China, which is now a major supplier to the world,” he maintained.

Usman said the company had set a target to complete the installation of five new rotary parking units by May-end.

A Ferris wheel-style automatic rotary parking system has been a long-desired project of Punjab Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who directed LePark to install these units in different areas of the provincial capital.

The company initially planned to install rotary parking units at Liberty Market but later changed its plan and installed the first unit in Ichra. Apart from other reasons, the chief minister had suspended the former LePark CEO for his failure to introduce a rotary parking system in the city.

The company is also trying to build new parking plazas in the city to overcome parking-related issues. It has already completed surveys of dozens of areas and identified locations for new parking plazas.

LePark has also forwarded proposals for the construction of new parking plazas at Hall Road, Awain-e-Adal, Nilla Gumbar, Fane Road and Ittefaq Hospital. Most of these plazas will be constructed on a build-own-transfer basis.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 12^th, 2017.