People living in historic hutong areas are furious about a plan to ban parking in their neighborhoods.

The residents want to continue to park outside their courtyard homes, instead of parking vehicles - as the plan demands - in parking lots outside the hutong areas.

The district authority in Dongcheng recently shared its draft plan, which calls for parking lots to be built for the 60,000 vehicles currently being parked in 500 hutongs each night. The local government says the large number of vehicles in the narrow streets causes congestion in the 17 historic areas in Dongcheng district.

"With the number of vehicles in Beijing passing four million last month, the municipal government has called on each district to provide more traffic facilities to support the fast growth," said a senior official surnamed Yang with the static state traffic department in Dongcheng district government.

Yang said hutongs, many of which were built hundreds of years ago, were never meant to cope with cars but are currently choked with parked vehicles.

"It makes the narrow paths in the hutong area more crowded and fire vehicles are not able to drive through if there is a fire," he said.

But many residents think they should be allowed to park near their homes.

"I have lived in the hutong almost 20 years and I have a space right in front of my home and it is free. Why should I park somewhere else?" said Zhang Jinkui, a Xiaojinchang hutong resident.

"Many of the cars parked in the hutongs belong to people visiting bars and restaurants in this area. They should be made to park outside the hutong, not the local residents."

The authority has said the planned lots will likely have to pay for parking. Yang said parking rates are still under discussion.

"I will not go to park in the new area if they charge us as much as those fancy parking zones in the CBD areas," said Zuo Biefeng, owner of a bar in Beiluoguxiang.

"If we have to park outside of the hutongs, I hope it will not take me more than 10 minutes to walk from my bar to my car."

Zuo said some customers currently phone him to ask if there is parking near the bar.

"I am worried that they will not come if they have to walk too far."