No space for fire tender parking

Charanjit Singh Teja

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, August 13

The fire brigade has no place to park its tenders. Fire tenders can be seen parked in the open as Partition Museum has come up in the Town Hall building, which was being used by the Central Fire Station. Though the government has introduced new fire tenders to revamp the system, firemen believe an arrangement should be made for parking of the emergency vehicles.

Nowadays, these vehicles are stationed outside the fire brigade office, next to the Partition Museum. The authorities concerned have got constructed a wall between the office of the Central Fire Station and the open yard in front of the Partition Museum office. Entry of heavy vehicles has been restricted in the area so fire station employees have started using another gate that opens towards the Saragarhi multi-storeyed car parking. The gate is too small to let fire tenders in so they have no option other than stationing their vehicles on the road outside the museum.

This has increased the burden of firemen as they have to keep a vigil on the vehicles. “We can’t leave the vehicles alone on the road as it is not safe. We have to keep a vigil in the day and sleep inside the vehicles at night. If the vehicles are parked inside the office complex, we need not keep an extra surveillance,” said a driver, requesting anonymity.

Fire Officer Sadiq Masih said, “We have been facing inconvenience after the shifting of the office. The new gate of the fire station towards the parking lot is congested. We don’t want to park the fire tenders on road but we don’t have any other option.”