Govt approves construction of 2,212 bus shelters in B'luru

Ad firms to build, manage bus stops on DBOOT basis for 20 yrs

The state government has given its approval to construct 2,212 bus shelters across Bengaluru, of which 1,610 bus shelters will come up by January 2017.

Another important feature of the project is that 300 bus shelters will have public toilets.

Locations for these bus shelters were selected after a joint survey by the officials of Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) and the traffic police. Traffic police were very specific that none of the bus shelters should be near any traffic junction to avoid traffic congestion.

These bus shelters will be erected on Design, Build, Own, Operate and Transfer (DBOOT) basis by the advertisement agencies, which have bagged the contract.

The advertisement companies will hold these bus shelters on a lease for 20 years during which period they can display the ads there. The ad agencies, in return, will have to pay Rs 45,000 for each bus shelters to the BBMP, every year. Speaking to DH, BBMP Chief Engineer (Major Roads) K T Nagaraj said the project has been divided into four packages with each package comprising a contract to build 550 bus shelters.

One of the packages has been reserved for scheduled castes and scheduled tribes.

“We invited tenders for these projects. While we got response for three packages, there were no takers for the package reserved for SC/ST. We will float fresh tenders for the SC/ST package,” said Nagaraj. Three packages have been given to Signpost India Private Limited and Times Innovative Media. The BBMP has decided not to set up more than two bus shelters at any place as happened in the past. For instance, there were about four bus shelters at Corporation circle and near Chinnaswamy Stadium. The designs of these bus shelters will be provided by the BBMP, which the advertisers will have to follow, said Nagaraj.

Auctioning of old shelters
Sources said that there are about 650-odd old bus shelters, which need to be dismantled due to rusting, poor designing, bad maintenance and odd locations. These bus shelters will be auctioned shortly.