MARGAO
How many more months and years will it take for the multi-level parking plaza to take shape in the commercial capital and ease the acute parking woes plaguing motorists and visitors to the city?
Well, if officials of the Goa State Urban Development Agency (GSUDA) are to be believed, the fate of the Rs 10 crore multi-level parking plaza project will be known very soon once the e-tender is opened by the agency. Officials told The Goan that GSUDA had floated a fresh e-tender inviting bids to execute the multi-level parking project in Margao after the first tender had received a lone bid.
“We hope that bidders evince interest in the construction of the multi-level parking lot so that the construction of the project can kick-start at the earliest,” the official said.
Questions, however, are being raised in city circles about when the multi-level parking project will finally see light of the day. The project was conceived nine years ago to build the parking lot at the old fish market behind the Margao Municipal building. After the foundation stone was laid in 2015, the MMC finally tendered the project two years later, before the plan was abandoned after the introduction of the GST regime.
The new council that took over office in 2021 finally decided to hand over the construction of the project to GSUDA after successive attempts by the civic body to get prospective bidders to execute the project came a cropper.
Remarked a citizen: “When the MMC had first proposed to build the multi-level parking project at the old market in 2015, we were all happy the parking woes plaguing the city would be finally resolved. Sadly, it’s now nine years, but the project is yet to see the light of the day. As of now, Margao needs at least 2-3 parking lots.”
Old Market project in limbo
While the Goa State Urban Development Agency (GSUDA) is scouting for a bidder to take up the multi-crore multi-level parking project in Margao, the status of the parking project on the Margao municipality-acquired land at the Old Market remains unknown.
Work on the project was initially scheduled to kick-start in May 2023, but was delayed by a couple of months after the Margao Municipal withheld the NOC for the work before it finally began in August last year. Work on the project, however, continues at the site and it remains unknown when the project will be completed in all respects.
The project had kicked up a row of sorts after local Fatorda MLA and Goa Forward Chief Vijai Sardesai laid the foundation stone for the project along with citizens.
GSUDA officials were unavailable for comments on the status of the parking project at Old Market and whether any deadline had been set for the contractor to complete the project.
