According to officials said yesterday that, paid parking spaces and pedestrian-only walking will be built in some city streets by Phnom Penh Municipal next month.

Moeung Sophan, deputy director of the public works department, said that Phnom Penh Municipal planned to begin the first step in Monivong Boulevard from Charles de Gaulle Boulevard to Street 120, followed by Kampuchea Krom Boulevard .

“The parking spaces will be built in next month. Our visions are to reduce the overcrowding on the road,” Mr. Sophan said. “There are also spaces for vehicle parking and spaces for pedestrians to walk, and it will not influence to people’s house,” he added.

Mr. Sophan said that Phnom Penh Municipal will announce for people to know about this new plan soon by television next week. Adding that the parking scheme was different from the one which was instituted on May on Charles de Gaulle Boulevard , where car parking was limited to park only two hours.

“The parking cost will be 1000 riel or $0.25 for the first hour, 500 riel for extra hour and monthly rates are also acceptable,” he said. “We have a contract with Edisijuta Company for five years. The revenue will be shared between the government and the company,” he added.

Pa Socheatvong, Deputy Phnom Penh Governor, said that the city also planned to add more parking spaces in some city streets more, like Mao Tse Toung Boulevard in order to made it easy for not only the car owners, but also the motorcycle and bicycle owners with parking services and walker with walking spaces will be available.

Road safety regional, Sann Socheata, said that she was happy to hear about the new plan of the city and this will be a good solution for the traffic jams and could reduce the crashes with pedestrians.

“If people can walk on pedestrian-only walking, they no longer walk on the road, and we can reduces the crashes with pedestrians which injured at least 13 percent among the whole traffic accident last year,” Mrs. Socheat said.