Khaberni - Amman, this city that we cherished with all its topography, history, memory, and warmth, is today suffering from oppressive congestion in its traffic arteries, making movement in it exhausting for the mind, body, and environment alike. The streets are crowded, cars are increasing, public spaces are diminishing, while solutions remain modest in the face of challenges from a city growing faster than its ability to organize and adapt. We are facing a real urban dilemma, the most prominent issue being: a lack of public parking, which fuels all forms of traffic chaos and distorts the urban landscape of our beautiful capital.
It is time we confront this reality with courage and responsible urban awareness. The Greater Amman Municipality, whose burdens we understand, today has a golden opportunity to make a qualitative leap in managing public space within the city. For many years, the municipality has collected parking fees from housing projects and facilities that are unable to provide the required parking due to topographic, regulatory, or design reasons, accumulating significant amounts. Logically, and morally and planning-wise, it is obligatory to reinvest this money in buying land within the urban fabric of the city and converting its use to organized public parking areas marked by the municipality, managed in a civilized manner befitting a capital like Amman.
Parking is not a luxury, but an economic and organizational necessity. When public parking is available at symbolic and well-thought-out prices, chaos declines, traffic flow improves, commercial activity increases, and the suffering of both residents and visitors alike decreases. The absence of parking encourages random parking on sidewalks and building entrances, turning streets into chaos zones that disrupt traffic, stress drivers, and increase environmental pollution and noise.
Smart cities in the world did not evolve by accident, but through bold decisions and far-sighted visions that put public interest above all considerations. Amman is no exception, but today it needs an executive will that realizes time is running out and spaces are diminishing. There are still lands available for investment in vital areas of the capital, but continued hesitation and delay will make us regret a missed opportunity in a few years when we find not a single piece of land suitable to be a public parking or an urban lung.
Concern for the city is not merely an emotional sentiment, but an intellectual and moral responsibility. From this standpoint, I call on the Amman Municipality to immediately prepare a comprehensive strategic plan to establish multi-use public parking lots in front of malls and markets and even within crowded residential neighborhoods, so that these parking areas become part of a sustainable public transport system, contributing to restoring discipline, comfort, and order to people's daily lives.
Let's give Amman an opportunity to breathe. Cities do not die suddenly but suffocate silently under the weight of neglect and the accumulation of unaccounted small details. Amman, deserving to remain vibrant with life, awaits its passionate citizens and aware officials to hurry to rescue it — before we find not a single piece of land to apologize for shortcomings or justify our inability before generations that will ask us: How did you let your city suffocate while you just watched?
