Udhagamandalam: Much to the joy of tourists, who had long been complaining about parking woes, the Government Rose Garden in Ooty is all set to get a parking lot soon with a capacity to accommodate 350 vehicles. Work on the Rs 3-crore project has already commenced on 1.5 acres land adjacent to the rose garden.“Tourist inflow to the garden sees a steep rise every year. And we often find it difficult to accommodate their vehicles,” Shiva Subramaniam Samraj, joint director (incharge) of horticulture department told TOI. “Hence, we have proposed for a parking area adjacent to the garden.”According to him, Rs 3 crore had already been sanctioned for the parking facility. “The spiral parking lot will accommodate at least 300 cars and 50 buses.” Samraj said the area identified for the project was owned by horticulture department. “It is filled with tea bushes and initial work has been commenced.”‘Rose Park’ was set up at Vijayanagar Farm here in May 1995 by the late J Jayalalithaa during her first tenure as chief minister to commemorate the centenary of the “peace de resistance” of the annual flower show.Since the garden was set up by Jaya, it was named after her then. When DMK came to power in 1996, it was rechristened as Rajiv Gandhi Rose Garden. However, this name also was changed. Till a few years ago, it was simply known as Centenary Rose Park. Later, the government rechristened it as the Government Rose Garden.Covering an area of four hectares, the garden today boasts of more than 30,000 rose plants of 4,000 odd varieties. The garden houses a section with about 1,000 plants of 300 heritage varieties.

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