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A community hall sans parking lot annoys Gulshan community

Tawfique Au
The main road of Gulshan Avenue in front of the National Shooting Federation (NSF) and adjacent alleys remain clogged up with vehicles parked illegally by the guests of a community hall run commercially by the NSF.
The NSF community hall does not have a parking facility, forcing the visitors and renters of the hall to park their vehicles on the roads and footpaths, causing traffic bottleneck during both day and night time in the entire area, said the locals.
"This is an anarchy. The streets are blocked causing public suffering but the authorities remain silent," said Arif Hasan, a resident of Gulshan-2. Hr is not understandable how the community hall is being run without car parking facility.”
The federation rents out the four-storey hall, with 14,200 square feet of commercial floor space, for holding wedding ceremonies, socials parties, examinations, get-together and exhibitions at least twice a day. It provides room for 800 guests at a time.
When this correspondent appeared in guise of an organiser of a wedding part)', Md Monir Hossain, an office staff of NSF, said that hall renters are advised to ask their guests and visitors to park vehicles on the footpaths and the Gulshan main avenue.
“You can park up to 400 vehicles at a time on the footpath, main road and alleys during the party,” said Monir.
The NSF authorities have converted the sidewalk in front of the complex in their own way to suit the car-parking purpose creating obstruction to pedestrianpassage.
The hall was rented out for O-
Levels examinations throughout die first week of May.
Huge crowds of parents, guardians, examination candidates and their attendants virtually brought the Gulshan Avenue to a standstill with die cars parked there on every exam day.
On a visit to the spot on May 6, the main avenue was found chokcd-up with illegal car parking all over on the footpath and the thoroughfare at 11:15am.
At around 10:00am the following day, an on-duty police sergeant was found struggling hard to manage the situation and free the avenue for public passage.
Traffic blockage between Gulshan circle-1 and shooting federation makes the public passage almost impassable during peak working hours.
Scuffles over parking space between the visitors and owners
of big commercial establishments along the Gulshan Avenue arc a daily phenomenon as these establishments use footpaths and part of the main avenue as their car- parking place.
Lack of car parking provision resulted in police brutality on the country's gold medallist shooter Asif Hossain Khan and others on October 2, 2006 at the NSF gate. On that day, a trade fair of women's garments was going on at the hall.
Police severely beat up Asif, national shooting coach Shoaibuzzaman, and others storming into the NSF complex following an altercation over parking of a car.
The NSF charges Tk 35,000 to 55,000 as rent of the hall room for one half of a day only. Besides, there are 15 percent VAT, and charges for Ugh ting and decorator.
According to the building
construction act and rules, any commercial buildings or auditorium must have parking provision in proportion with the floor area. The question is how the commercial establishment was built without keeping parking provision.
A Rajuk official said Rajuk was aware that NSF was building a commercial hall without parking provision but could not do anything because of undue influence.
Morshedul Alam, deputy commissioner (traffic, north) of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP), said that enforcement of motor vehicle act and traffic rules has a correlation with ensuring parking provisions at an establishment.
"We have asked Rajuk again and again to make sure that a building keeps parking provision," he said. "How can traffic police alone rectify traffic mess if the agencies concerned do not enforce their relevant laws?”
Alam further said, "We file around 150 cases a day on average against those who park vehicles illegally in Gulshan area."
The visitors of a commercial establishment park their cars on the road if there is no parking facilities in a building, said Alam. "We do not permit anybody to park vehicles on the main avenue in anyway," he said.
NazimUddin Chowdhury, general secretary of NSF, said they accommodate around 15 to 20 car parking inside the federa-flon complex. “That apart, we ask the visitors to park their vehicles on the adjoining footpaths and surrounding alleys."
Replying to a question how such a huge commercial hall was built without car parking provision, he said it was built long back when he was not an official ofNSF.
He further said that they are looking for an interested bidder for an underground parking facility on build-operate-transfer basis.
Following the incident of police brutality on the gold medallist shooter in 2006, the then NSF chairman Abdul Muyeed Chowdhury said that they were thinking of a basement parking facility. But the situation remains unchanged.