Hanoi will begin to ration its parking spaces this month in an effort to minimize traffic congestion.
The capital plans to institute an odd-even rule for four-wheeled vehicles, allowing car owners from odd-numbered houses to park on one side of the street one day and car owners from even-numbered houses to park on the other side the following day, reports VnExpress.
The new system will run on a trial basis, beginning first with Da Tuong Street in Hoan Kiem District. If successful, the scheme will then expand to Nguyen Gia Thieu and Cua Dong Streets, also in Hoan Kiem, as well as Tran Xuan Soan and Le Dai Hanh Streets in Hai Ba Trung District.
Hanoi’s new parking rules have been in the works for a while. Back in August city Chairman Nguyen Duc Chung announced that the capital would begin to alter its parking practices and vowed to keep the public abreast of the situation. Since then, Hanoi has banned vehicles around Hoan Kiem Lake on weekends in an effort to boost tourism and also introduced a long-term plan to eliminate motorbikes in the downtown area.
Moving forward with the new parking scheme, city officials are considering a host of factors, such as the number of parking spaces on a given street and the size of each vehicle, as they calculate parking fees for each car owner.
So far, the rule has received positive feedback.
“Pilot parking on odd and even days is a necessary solution to ease traffic congestion, especially in inner city areas,” Pham Van Duc, director of the Hanoi Parking Company, told VietnamNet. “Of course, it is only an urgent and short-term solution.”
As the cost of Hanoi’s higher-end parking spaces reaches as much as US$50,000, the municipal government hopes the new scheme will ease at least some of the capital’s traffic congestion.
Its other transportation goal – to make downtown Hanoi motorbike-free by 2025 – has since been revised, with municipal authorities aiming to eliminate two-wheeled vehicles from the city center by 2030.
Late last month, Hanoi’s Party Secretary Hoang Trung Hai told Dan Tri: “Hanoi may delay the motorbike ban in the downtown areas from 2030, instead of the year of 2025 as planned earlier so that the city will have more time for transport infrastructure development.”
The capital is currently home to approximately 5 million motorbikes. With another 19,000 new vehicles registered each month, VnExpress estimates the number of motorbikes in the city will hit 7.3 million by 2025, along with 1.3 million cars.
[Photo via Honda Oto Hanoi]
