The onset of the Sabarimala season is likely to affect the East Fort area, especially the roads surrounding and leading to the Sree Padmanabhaswamy Temple, in an extremely negative way, with traffic chaos already being predicted.
The lack of parking space for the several hundreds of vehicles, including tourist buses carrying pilgrims to and from Sabarimala stopping in for darshan at the Sree Padmanabhaswamy Temple, is being cited as the prime reason that could aggravate the existing parking chaos in the area.
More space
The City Traffic Police is trying to identify more spaces, apart from the Putharikandam Grounds and the open space opposite Rangavilasom Palace, as parking lots for the visiting vehicles. “We are looking at maximum utilisation of the available space. People trying to park their vehicles as close as possible to the temple will be an issue. We are looking at streamlining traffic and parking, since our options are limited,” said K. Sanjay Kumar Gurudin, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order), admitting that parking would be a serious issue in the season. Deployment of additional forces, continuous monitoring of parking in areas close to the temple and all-out efforts to ensure that the main traffic was not affected would be done, he added.
