Lieutenant-Governor Tejendra Khanna on Thursday called a meeting of all stakeholders to draw a consensus on “substantially increasing” parking charges in the city in a bid to reduce congestion in the available parking lots. Chief Secretary P K Tripathi is learnt to have suggested the need for optimising the surface parking space, before going for underground or multi-level car parking facilities. Sources said civic agencies have been asked to ensure there is adequate parking space in residential colonies, before the Delhi government can implement its plan of regularising the additional floors in these areas. The commissioners of all three municipal corporations and chairperson of NDMC Archna Arora were part of the meeting. All parties accepted the suggestion to charge residents for parking in their colonies. Chairperson of the Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority Bhure Lal, who also present at the meeting, suggested that charges for parking in public areas be increased substantially. The charge, EPCA said, must be levied on an hourly basis under three slabs — A, B and C, where Category A are the most visited areas withe parking issues. “It was suggested that for Category A, Rs 30 be charged for the first hour, and Rs 40 for every subsequent hour,” an official close to the developments said. Joint Commissioner of Police (Traffic) Satyendra Garg held a different view, saying increasing rates will only lead to unauthorised parking. “My view is that the parking woes be dealt with by increasing supply. There is a category of commuters who would not want to use the public transport. We need to offer a robust two-tier public transport system — where we have the Metro and buses, and on the other hand we offer reliable personalised public transport, in autos and taxis on call,” Garg told Newsline. Officer on Special Duty to the L-G Ranjan Mukherjee said: “Minutes of the meeting, with suggestions of all, would be forwarded to all departments again for their opinion, before any policy level decision is taken.” Senior officials of UTTIPEC and Delhi government, and Transport Commissioner and Urban Development Secretary R Chandramohan were also present at the meeting.