More than 700 transport companies have their offices and godowns in a five km radius around the Golden Tobacco crossing and Nandesari on the Vadodara-Delhi, Vadodara-Mumbai and Vadodara-Ahmedabad routes. The offices of 500-odd other companies are scattered throughout the city.

Despite the high concentration of transporters, Vadodara is the only one of the six major cities of the State not to have parking facilities for goods trucks coming all the way from Punjab and West Bengal. Not just the out-of-State vehicles, the Vadodara Regional Transport Office-registered 13,000 goods trucks and 3,400 tankers, too, reportedly have no access to proper facilities; the offices are also said to lack drinking water, electricity and telephone facilities.

``This despite the fact that the State government earns a whopping Rs 33 crores through road taxes and permit fees annually'', says Baroda Road Transport general secretary P M Vaghela.

Talking about the inconveniences truckers faced, BRTA president Surendra Yadav says, ``The 4000 goods trucks that arrive in Vadodara every day are forced to park on the streets -- sometimes, even the main carriageway -- because the highway shoulders (i.e. the stretch adjoining the main road) are not strong enough to bear the weight of heavy goods vehicles.''

The problem was compounded during the monsoons, he adds, when cranes had to be hired to pull out heavy vehicles mired in the slush near the Golden crossing.

Moreover, alleges S P Sharma, BRTA secretary, transporters had to contend with the traffic police, the RTO and the national highway authorities for parking along roads.

To Vaghela's charge that Superintending Engineer of the Vadodara National Highway Circle M M Jivani had threatened ``severe action'' against truckers for wrongful parking, the NH official says, ``Roadside parking leads to traffic jams and accidents. Most importantly, leaking oil also damages the road surface.'' Action was imminent against trucks parking on the highways, he adds.

While both the parties seem to be justified in their complaints, the solution appears to lie with the Vadodara Urban Development Authority. According to VUDA president Krishnakant Shah, disputes over compensation on land was holding up plans to set up two transport nagars -- one near the Golden Tobacco crossing and the other near Nandesari. ``While the State government has agreed to compensate farmers 89 paise per square feet, the Golden Crossing farmers are demanding Rs 5/sq ft'', he says. In Nandesari, farmers also want Rs 5/sq ft, but the government wants to go up only to Rs 3.

Vadodara (rural) BJP MP Dilubha Chudasama, in whose constituency the area falls, also believes the compensation being offered by the State government was far below the market price. ``I have taken up the matter, and will ensure the farmers get Rs 15/sq ft'', he adds.