Public facilities: Teething troubles persist with Liberty parking

Revenue reported at same level as before, lack of space and shopkeepers still issues.

LAHORE:

The automation of the Liberty Market parking lot has not been going according to plan, with revenue staying at the same level as before and software problems, a shortage of space and issues with shopkeepers remaining unresolved, The Express Tribune has learnt.

A Turkish company named UCS automated the parking lot for LePark, or the Lahore Parking Company, which was formed recently in order to manage parking facilities in the city.

The automated parking lot was inaugurated around six weeks ago by Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif. Since then, revenue has stayed around the same level as before: Rs40,000 a day on weekdays and Rs70,000 a day on weekends.

Eight days ago, officials from the city district government were stationed at the parking lot to assess the situation. Since then, revenue has gone up to Rs70,000 a day on weekdays and Rs100,000 a day on weekends, said the officials concerned, suggesting that the revenue figure was being under-reported or that not everyone was being charged for parking.

Operation of the Liberty Market parking lot is to be auctioned off eventually. The officials said that if average revenue of Rs40,000 to Rs70,000 a day is reported, the contract would be auctioned off for less than if it was bringing in revenue of Rs70,000 to Rs100,000 a day. They said that under-reported revenue would be of benefit to bidders in the auction.

District Officer (Public Facilities) Fahad Anees said that revenue had gone up because everyone, including shopkeepers, had been forced to buy parking tickets by the city government officials stationed there for the last eight days. He said that 350 shopkeepers would eventually be given stickers for their cars so they could park without buying a ticket.

Fasihuddin, spokesman for LePark, said that there were several teething problems at the parking lot. He said various software issues remained. For example, the system did not record all the parking tickets and hence the total revenue generated.



He said that recently, three men hired to work at the parking lot were fired for running a scam to steal revenue. He said that Bilal, Rauf and Mohsin had been keeping the parking lot open for an extra hour after it was supposed to close and pocketing the parking fees. He said they had been caught not because the system had detected a mismatch in revenue and parking cards, but via CCTV cameras.

Fasihuddin said that there had also been difficulties in collecting fees from shopkeepers, who had demanded free parking spaces.

There have also been troubles with computer cards and space. The parking cards ran out on Wednesday and for almost two days, motorists were again being handed parking receipts manually.

Amir, the UCS general manager (operations) for the Liberty parking lot, said that he had only recently joined his post and could not comment on why revenue had not risen with the automated parking system. He said that a new supply of automated parking cards had been received on Thursday and the system reactivated.

Huge lines at the entrance and exit to the parking lot have been seen since the automated system was introduced. Fazal Cheema, a resident of Shadman, said that he had to wait at least 15 minutes to exit the parking area. He said that the number of parking lanes should be increased from two to four.

Both the LePark and UCS representatives agreed that there was not enough parking space.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 7^th, 2012.