JOIN USLow build quality, lower utility value, guaranteed delays and cost over-runs of mammoth proportions. Bengaluru’s road infrastructure projects should have taught lessons galore in mismanagement to the government. But, in its rush to build more elevated corridors of questionable utility, has the State cold-shouldered long-term sustainable transport solutions to decongest Bengaluru?
Urban mobility analysts and a few government insiders themselves are convinced that the high cost flyovers cannot solve the city’s acute traffic congestion. Flyovers might offer temporary relief for a few years, but only after trapping commuters in a twister of construction-linked traffic chaos for long. Eventually, every new lane gets filled up with cars and SUVs. That just doesn’t seem logical!
Costly projects
Yet, six new corridors with long stretches of them elevated, are in the pipeline. Besides, the Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) is all set to invite tenders for a 6.7-km elevated corridor connecting Basaveshwara Circle and Hebbal Junction.
The estimated cost of this project is a whopping Rs. 1,350 crore, ready for completion only in two years. When it was first announced in the State budget, the estimated cost was only Rs 1,000 crore.
The objective is clear: Create more road space for motorised private vehicles, whose numbers have been unrelentingly explosive. An estimated 56 lakh vehicles are packed into the city’s estimated 10,200 km of road length. Creating more corridors for them would simply mean incentivizing more cars, more private transport.
Seeking a shift from this policy skewed heavily in favour of motorized transport, an online petition on Change.org has urged the Chief Minister to stop the project. The petitioner, Sathya Sankaran reasons, with particular reference to the Hebbal junction project, “This elevated road will be full the day it is finished building and will not alleviate any traffic jams.”
The corridor, says Sankaran, will, in fact, move the jams to Hebbal as seen by the elevated highway on the NHAI side. “You have to come to the surface somewhere and you know it is not a cakewalk at that point.”
Reservations within govt
It is learnt that the Directorate of Urban Land Transport (DULT) attached to the State Urban Development Department is itself against building more elevated corridors. DULT, sources say, wants the government to push for sustainable options such as more public transport buses and bus priority lanes. Corridors cannot be a solution, augmenting mass transit systems is.
Three years ago, a government-appointed committee had shot down the proposal for another elevated corridor project passing through Koramangala. It was based on a study by the IISc Centre for infrastructure Sustainable Transportation and Urban Planning (CiSTUP) that cited high costs, traffic management problems and ‘division of communities’ in the vicinity.
Existing flyovers are clear proof that elevation does not necessarily decongest traffic. A flyover merely transfers traffic load from the entry point to the exit point, triggering chaos elsewhere. For instance, the poorly designed and executed Richmond Circle flyover bears testimony to this fact. Speeding vehicles alight the Electronic City elevated corridor only to face the congestion at the Silk Board junction. This scenario recurs at the Esteem Mall junction.
Underneath most elevated monsters, the roads are left to rot as though people down there are not worth any good infrastructure. The petition draws attention to a recent statement by Union Minister for Road Transport that building 55 flyovers in Mumbai has not solved any problem there.
No transparency
Lack of transparency is another issue. Public consultation is not part of the process, although commuters are subjected to tremendous inconveniences during and after the construction. Projects are decided and pushed through despite experts clearly advising the government against the massive pillar-laying projects.
Why the fixation with unsustainable projects? A Sadashivanagar resident and a cyclist for 15 years, Dasarathi G V, puts the blame squarely on the greed for kickbacks. “Flyovers and such massive projects are a constant source of bribery. It is a very big income, when the kickbacks could go up to 40 per cent.”
As a citizen, Dasarathi terms the corridor proposal a ‘very bad idea.’ He explains, “We should be reducing the number of vehicles rather than catering to them. In the last two decades, we have been building these elevated corrirdors. There will come a time soon when all of these will be choked.”