THE city’s transport commission is planning to build mechanical multi-story parking garages in 10 pilot locations within the year to tackle the parking problem in the city, the Southern Metropolis Daily reported yesterday.

There were 3.4 million vehicles registered in Shenzhen as of November last year, which was three times the number of parking spaces in the city, according to the report.

During the city’s “two sessions” this year, lawmaker Chen Chengjiu urged the government to build more parking spaces in accordance with the city’s urban planning guidelines.

According to the guidelines, each 90-to-144-square-meter apartment should be equipped with 1 to 1.2 parking spaces, while each apartment larger than 144 square meters should be equipped with 1.2 to 1.5 parking spaces. A multi-functional park should have eight to 15 parking spaces per hectare, and a hospital should have 0.8 to 1.8 parking spaces for each bed.

The parking problem is a big headache for parents in Shenzhen when they pick up or drop off their kids at school. The commission has proposed several solutions to the problem, including building multi-story parking garages near schools, sharing nearby parking facilities during non-peak hours and putting more school buses into use.

In response to some lawmakers who suggested building temporary public parking lots in high-traffic-flow areas, the commission said it was drafting relevant regulations to simplify approval procedures for the construction of multi-story mechanical parking garages in the city.

Additionally, the commission has researched nearly 100 locations across the city and is planning on building multi-story mechanical parking garages in 10 pilot locations within the year.

Some lawmakers have also suggested that the government introduce new policies to encourage developers of newly built or renovated real estate projects to build more public parking facilities in the estates if the surrounding areas are short of parking spaces.

The commission said it would gradually increase the supply of parking facilities in Shenzhen based on the conditions in the city’s different functional areas. It is also planning to build a smart parking cloud platform to connect different parking management systems with one another to improve the service efficiency of parking facilities.

(Zhang Yang)