The city of Ghent wants to limit the provision of building permits for paved parking spaces in newly built front gardens.
Ghent's city council wants to pursue a stricter parking policy and give more green space to the city, reports VRT.
“By installing a driveway, you privatise the street. Just like with garages, other drivers are not allowed to park in front of it," said city cabinet member for public spaces, Filip Watteeuw, reports HLN.
"A front garden is a garden. It must be green," Watteeuw explained, reports De Standaard.
The push by Ghent city council to limit paved parking spaces has come up against criticism.
The measure was described as "bullying people with a car" by N-VA Ghent city councillor and party chairman Anneleen Van Bossuyt.
"I agree that hardening of front gardens is to be avoided as much as possible, but that does not have to exclude the construction of a parking space," explained Van Bossuyt.
The city of Ghent will simply be implementing existing regulations, according to Watteeuw.
"To prevent all public parking spaces from disappearing from a street, it was already forbidden to pave a front garden. Of course, some [people] still did it without a permit," said Watteeuw.
Evie McCullough
The Brussels Times
