Bengalureans may be protesting the building of a steel flyover between Chalukya Circle and Hebbal in large numbers but the government continues to believe the protest is orchestrated and of little importance. It doesn’t seem to care that the BDA’s own Master Plan 2030 makes no mention of such a project to decongest city roads. What will it take to convince it?
“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results,” Albert Einstein once said. There couldn’t be a better time or situation to recall this as the state government continues to believe that building more flyovers is going to solve the traffic troubles of the city when past experience has proved otherwise.
Its latest project is a steel flyover costing around Rs 1800 crore from Chalukya Circle to Hebbal, which it promises will cut travel time to the international airport. Although the Windsor Manor Bridge, Mekhri Circle underpass and Hebbal flyover, that dot the route it will take have not been able to solve the traffic congestion here in peak hours, the government seems to believe that the new steel bridge will achieve what they have not.
Read: Protest manufactured, backed by BJP: KJ George
Interestingly, while the state government is adamant about building the steel flyover and axing over 800 trees in the process, ignoring widespread public protests, there’s no mention of it in the Bengaluru Development Authority’s 2031 Master Plan.
Urban planning expert, Ashwin Mahesh notes that the latest master plan for the city only focuses on improving the existing road network , providing more public transport and a commuter rail system to improve traffic conditions in the city.
“Interestingly, the BDA also gives importance to pedestrian safety and aims to provide comfortable and safe facilities for those walking on city roads. Also, in a never-before move, it speaks about re-establishing the role of bicycles in Bengaluru. What part of the steel flyover squares with any of this?” he asks pertinently, adding that while the government is busy dismissing everyone opposing the steel bridge, its own Master Plan for the city is following their reasoning in improving mobility by focusing more on buses , commuter rail, pedestrians and cyclists, and not on private vehicles. “It has proposed a network solution, and not adhoc solutions at different junctions,” he observes.
Read: Guest Column: Adhoc projects messing up Bengaluru
Prominent city architect, Naresh Narasimhan, also points out that the Ballari Road is not even the city’s worst bottleneck and the Silk Board Junction and K.R Puram flyover have bigger traffic problems.
“When the state government can decongest traffic on Ballari Road by widening the Esteem Mall Junction at a cost of about '200 crore, why is it adamant on spending Rs 1,800 crore to achieve the same effect? If need be, it can build two or three underpasses at half the cost instead of making a VVIP road and tolling its users,” he says.
A professor of the Indian Institute of Science( IISc) warns the proposed flyover could become easily redundant should another government in the state feel the need for a new airport elsewhere.
“The flyover has no long term vision and by the time a new government wakes up to the fact that the flyover is redundant, we may have lost our trees. True, steel flyovers are easier to assemble, but the city does not need such an expensive one when there are so many other solutions to decongest Bengaluru,” he underlines.
Flyover to do a Khoday Tower?
Two years ago BBMP officials came under fire from city corporators for allowing the construction of Khoday Tower, a high-rise building, in a high security zone opposite the Raj Bhavan. Following all the hue and cry the civic agency even tried to evict the occupants of the building.
But now history seems to be repeating itself as the steel flyover that has been proposed for the city will give commuters a good view of the Chief Minister’s residence and the Air Force Station Training Command Headquarters at Mekhri Circle, both high security establishments, as it will run 12 feet over the Hebbal flyover and parallel to it.
