Ufa deputies are in a hurry to introduce their payment

Deputies of the Ufa City Council intend to speed up consideration of the issue of organizing paid parking in the city. It can be introduced much earlier than 2017, to which city manager Irek Yalalov postponed the implementation of this initiative. In the near future, the mayor's office plans to allocate sites for the construction of robotic multi-level parking lots. The authorities promise to finally decide on an alternative to free parking in the fall, after the city’s transport strategy is approved.

Paid parking in Ufa may become a reality within a year
Photo: Yuri Martyanov, Kommersant / buy photo

City Council Speaker Evgeniy Semivelichenko told reporters yesterday that city deputies do not intend to delay the introduction of paid parking on the streets of Ufa. He emphasized that “plans and proposals (on this topic - Kommersant) have been formed,” and he himself, “as a resident of Ufa, warmly and fully supports this event.” Charging money for parking “will have a positive impact on the transport situation, first of all, in the city center,” believes Mr. Semivelichenko. At the same time, he hinted, deputies are ready to consider the issue even earlier than previously stated by Ufa city manager Irek Yalalov. At the end of December, Mr. Yalalov spoke about the possible introduction of payment for parking only in 2017, but Evgeniy Semivelichenko believes that the issue can be resolved “at the end of this - early next year.” He noted that the initiative will have a positive impact on the city budget revenues, the deficit of which this year is estimated at 800 million rubles.

An informed interlocutor at the mayor's office confirmed to Kommersant that the topic is being actively studied. In the fall, the administration expects to receive a draft city transport strategy until 2030, a separate block of which will be devoted to solving the problems of traffic jams and the development of parking spaces. In addition to paid parking, the authorities considered introducing a fee for entering the center as one of the methods to combat the overabundance of transport in the historical center. At the same time, it was noted that the administration would first take care of creating a sufficient number of alternative places for free parking and regulate the operation of public transport.

However, in the near future, the mayor’s office plans to allocate sites to businessmen for the construction of multi-tiered robotic parking lots in the center. In particular, the owner of the PSK-6 group, city council deputy Andrei Noskov, intends to develop this business. The entrepreneur refused to name the locations of the two parking lots for which he is ready to rent land from the city, but clarified that we are talking about the construction of two parking lots with 155 spaces each. He estimates investments in each of them at approximately 600–800 thousand rubles. Options for leasing parking spaces can be different - hourly or long-term, Mr. Noskov noted and added that with an optimistic forecast, parking lots could be completed by the summer of 2016.

In neighboring Yekaterinburg, where parking fees were introduced last August, this activity brings the city budget monthly, according to media reports, up to 600 thousand rubles. at a rate of 30 rubles. at one o'clock.

The director of the Moscow Center for Research on Transport Problems of Megacities, Konstantin Trofimenko, using the example of Moscow, notes that in paid parking areas the streets became less congested, and the overall speed of traffic in these areas increased by an average of 10%, since “at rush hour, up to a third of all motorists circled around the center in search of parking space, slowing down the flow." Paid parking stimulates the development of the parking business, the expert agrees: “As long as you can leave your car for free on the side of the road, no one will invest in this industry.” At the same time, Mr. Trofimenko drew attention, in paid parking zones it is necessary to provide access to “comfortable public transport” and organize “intercept parking lots where motorists will park their cars.” “If these conditions are met, the authorities will be able to reduce the degree of public discontent, which in any case will accompany the introduction of payment at first,” the expert concluded.

Bulat Bashirov

Parking lots set in motion