With festival shoppers crowding the city’s major shopping areas, parking spaces are hard to come by.

To ease the parking problem, the Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) has opened free parking service at Tundikhel ground for people visiting New Road and Khichapokhari areas for Dashain shopping. 

 Traffic police as well as staff from the Kathmandu Metropolitan City have been tasked with management of parking areas and traffic congestion, said Bishnu Prasad Joshi, chief of metropolitan city police.

“There is a major problem of parking spaces in and around New Road and Khichapokhari areas these days. Converting Tundikhel ground into a parking area was the only way to accommodate the car and motorcycle numbers,” said Joshi.

The KMC has requested all vehicle owners visiting Sundhara, Khichapokhari, New Road, Mahabouddha and Basantapur areas to park their motors at Tundikhel. 

To ease the traffic congestion, the Kathmandu Metropolitan Traffic Police Division has started diverting taxis and hired vehicles from entering New Road, Ason and Jamal areas.

 “There is no point getting the vehicles in these areas because they won’t find any parking space. On top of that, they will be making the problem of traffic congestion worse,” said Joshi.

Besides parking and the traffic jams, the KMC is also having to deal with the problem of street vendors crowding the walkways. 

Officials say street vendors are occupying the streets and sidewalks at places like Ason, Ratnapark, New Road and Sundhara, making it difficult for people to move about freely.

While the KMC staffs have removed around 300 street vendors in the area in the past one week alone, more have cropped up as the main festival day gets nearer.