How safe is parking at Addis Ababa Bole International Airport?

Beyond addressing parking management, it is important to recognize that Addis Ababa continues to develop at a rapid pace with major new land developments.


J.P. Singh, VisionRIJ.P. Singh, VisionRI | Updated: 12-12-2019 16:27 IST | Created: 14-03-2018 03:08 IST
How safe is parking at Addis Ababa Bole International Airport?
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  • Country:
  • Ethiopia

Experience of driving or walking around Addis Ababa makes quite clear that the roads are congested and the traffic can be, at times pretty bad. That is because there has been a rather large influx of cars coming into the country - thousands per year, by some estimates.

As corollary to the bad traffic situation on the roads, the city faces challenges in managing its parking spaces on account of various reasons.

Parking is not well controlled in Addis Ababa with consequent disruptions to traffic flow and adverse impacts on daily living.

The existing parking service is inadequate and suffers from structural problems, mainly street parking. Consequently, it has contributed to inefficient utilization of the road network, safety and congestion problems.

Discussions by Devdiscourse with few road commuters reveal that there is substantial demand for the parking spaces while the availability is limited.

Paid parking, where it exists, is handled manually by parking attendants. Even there are reports of charging unfair payment for parking under some of the buildings.

The parking situation is bound to become progressively worse as motor vehicle ownership continues to grow. Before September 2011, the total number of cars with a code two license plate in Addis Ababa, which denotes a vehicle meant for personal use, was no more than 100,000.

In the past three years, however, close to 48,000 cars with code two plates have joined the roads of Addis Ababa. The total number of all kinds of vehicles registered under the ownership of city dwellers has now surpassed the 400,000 mark, as per a report in Ethiopian Business Review.

Parking spaces will become scarce in key areas both for commerce and housing with attendant inconvenience for merchants and residents alike with adverse impacts on traffic flow.

Provision of parking under the high rise buildings, at the congested area and market center such as Merkato, Piazza, Bole Road, Kera, Mexico Square and street side came up.

However, the need is for a coherent parking policy including well spelled out parking norms and space standards and development of off-street and on-street parking facilities.

Accordingly, there is a need to develop a city-wide parking strategy and implementation program to address these issues and to utilize parking pricing as a means for encouraging parking turnover and as a traffic constraint measure in congested city areas.

Beyond addressing parking management, it is important to recognize that Addis Ababa continues to develop at a rapid pace with major new land developments.

The residential real estate market in Addis Ababa is evolving into a varied mix of extensive government-built condominiums (ostensibly for lower-income groups), mid-market developments by housing cooperatives, and largely high-end homes built by real estate developers and/or homeowners themselves.

Such new developments have substantial impact on traffic conditions in the city. Taking this phenomenon into account it will be important for the city to have established policies for assessing the traffic impact of proposed new land developments, for determining how to regulate the design of these developments with respect to their traffic impact, and for determining the possible financial role of developers with respect to mitigating the adverse traffic impacts of these developments.

Taking into account these parking and traffic impact challenges, the Traffic Management Agency (TMA) of Addis Ababa is working towards developing a coherent parking strategy for the city.

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