Coimbatore: In an effort to address the complaints from rail passengers about fleecing of parking lot contractors at the city railway station, authorities are planning to start work to set up an electronic parking system from today. Rs 4.75lakh has been allotted for the project, an official said The parking lot, that will accommodate 15 cars, will have the entrance near the post office. The entrance will split into two - one for parking cars and the other for vehicles that drop passengers and leave the station.“Due to space constraints, we are coming up with a separate bay where taxis, auto rickshaws and cars can enter and drop passengers,” said a senior railway official. Another four bays will be set up exclusively for VIPs and differently-abled passengers, he added.The entrance to the parking lot will be fitted with a ticket vending machine and an electronic boom barrier. Vehicles entering for parking will have to get tickets that will have bar code. Vehicles that enter for dropping passengers will not be charged or stopped.The machine will be integrated with an application so that senior railway officials can monitor the contractors. At the exit gate, there will be a booth with an employee, who will scan the bar code and collect parking fee. “We decided to adopt the same system used in malls and airports,” said an official.The entire installation cost is estimated at Rs 4.75 lakh and the work will be completed within a week. “Since the capacity is less, the parking fee will be higher. We are yet to fix the rates,” he said.Vehicles can be parked only for 12 hours. Those who want to use it for more hours will be charged on an hourly basis.Officials said that work on the multi-level parking system near the back entrance of the railway station will be completed within six months. “Once that is completed, the two-wheeler parking lot in the front entrance will be shifted there, making more space for cars,” said an official.The multi-level parking system will have four floors - one underground for just cars, one ground floor for office space and two floors for two-wheeler parking. It will be fully automated and will accommodate at least 500 two-wheelers.

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