New Delhi:If you are in Delhi and own a car, then surely you must have faced a problem with parking. Especially, on a weekend the struggle to park your car in a crowded market area or multiplex increases ten times. According to a report there are a total of 18 lakh registered passenger cars in Delhi. For this, there are only 35,000 registered parking spaces available in Delhi, as per the estimates given by the MCD, NDMC and DDA. Suresh Chopra, a businessman complains, "When I go to places like Rajouri Garden, Sarojini or Lajpat Nagar on weekends, it's impossible to find a proper parking place. At peak hours from 6 pm to 10 pm, one will always face problems finding a suitable place to park specially outside a mall or multiplex." Hence, one can understand the need for proper parking systems in Delhi and the NCR. To solve the problems of commuters a new concept of automatic multi-level parking system will be introduced in Delhi. This system is already operational in many cities like Mumbai, Chennai and Bangalore. In Delhi, private real estate developers have been a little late in adopting the use of automatic multi-level parking systems. However, this is changing now and with the new master plan in Delhi, many private projects in the NCR region are expected to get implemented in about a year from now. The local bodies such as the MCD, NDMC and DDA also have plans to build automatic multi-level car parking-cum-commercial complexes in Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) mode at many sites in the coming year. Pranav Poddar, director Suvidha Parklift Ltd, who brought this multi-level parking concept to India and has worked on many such projects, explains the benefits of this system. He says, "Multi-level parking systems offer space-saving solutions to park a car. When compared to a conventional ramp-based parking garage, there is a saving of at least 30 per cent in the ground area, as ramps are not required in automatic systems. Also, the height required at each floor of an automatic parking facility is much less than conventional facilities. The floor-to-floor height in an automatic facility varies from 2 to 2.5 meters for compact cars and SUVs. Whereas the floor to floor height in a conventional ramp-based parking facility is more than three meters." But is this parking system safe and cost-efficient? He answers, "It's extremely safe and ensures scratch and hassle-free handling of cars. We have executed such systems even for 10 cars, and are in the process of executing such systems for a few thousands of cars also at a single site. Energy costs for operation of such systems vary from Rs 0.25 to Rs 1 per car parking and retrieval cycle depending upon the level of automation."