Mumbai: No one wants to develop parking app for BMC

The app would provide citizens with round-the-clock information about all parking lots available across Mumbai. File pic

Despite a delay of several years, the BMC hasn't found a solution to implement a parking policy. Even the idea of the parking app has remained a distant dream. The deadline for the tender to develop the app has been extended further as there isn't any response. Many of the BMC's policies are in slumber mode. The parking policy is one of them. The BMC appointed a panel comprising All-India Institute of Local Self Government (AIILSG) and Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) teams in 2019 to conduct a study and come up with the first-of-its-kind parking authority for the city. After repeated extensions, the BMC dissolved the panel and announced in May 2023 that it would come up with a parking app soon - one of the solutions recommended by the panel, by creating a parking interface for Mumbai. Accordingly, the civic body floated a tender to create an automated parking system under the proposed Mumbai Parking Authority (MPA). However, the BMC has not received any response.

According to BMC officers, the tender was for the selection of a system integrator for the design, development, implementation, operation and maintenance of a sensor-based, automated parking, guidance and management system, complete with a camera, a digital payment mechanism and video analytics. The software implementation was supposed to be done in phases - Phase 1 for off-street parking and Phase 2 for on-street parking.

BMC officials claimed that this would be a game-changer as citizens will be able to obtain comprehensive round-the-clock information about all parking lots available across Mumbai on their mobile devices. Payments could also be made online without much human intervention.

"The tender date has been extended to July 15. We will go ahead once we get a suitable response," said a BMC officer.

The BMC mentioned a parking app in the Budget 2024-25 for the fifth year in a row, but the deadline for the app to go live hasn't been set yet. The BMC has been planning to streamline parking woes through the app. It was a part of the MPA, which was first mentioned in the Development Plan 2034.

July 15
New deadline for submission of bids