The current government’s move to give a facelift to the city’s infrastructure, with assembly election round the corner, has only led to chaos all over the city with trees being cut, roads dug up and drains being desilted. Experts feel the government could have undertaken all these projects through a planned approach over the last four years, rather than rush through it in the last lap of their tenure, report Chandrashekar G and Aknisree Karthik
Once a Garden City with an abundance of trees and parks, Bengaluru is presently not a sight for sore eyes. Not only have most of its trees disappeared, but it is of late beginning to resemble a large construction site with a number of infrastructure projects underway across it, making it even more crowded and dustier than usual, and leaving its people miserable.
While most had applauded Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s move to give priority to Bengaluru’s development by allocating Rs 7,300 crore to improve its infrastructure over the two financial years of 2016-17 and 2017, they hadn’t reckoned with the government taking up almost all the projects nearly simultaneously and in a hurry with elections round the corner.
Besides work on phase 2 of the Metro Rail, which is already disfiguring it in many areas, the city is seeing work on signal- free corridors being created on the Old Airport Road, Old Madras Road, Okalipuram and the Mysore Road to Central Silk Board stretch, on four laning the elevated corridor between Ejipura junction and Kendriya Sadan in Koramangala, providing a distribution network to supply Cauvery water to 110 villages and on building an under-bridge at Hebbal to ease traffic on Ballari Road. Says a disgusted Mr D S Rajashekar, president of the Citizens’ Action Forum, “It doesn’t matter which party is in power. It only wakes up in the the last lap when the next assembly elections are round the corner as it wants to tell the people it has so many projects underway. It also begins to inaugurate one project after another to get kickbacks and use the funds for elections.”
While welcoming the move to supply Cauvery water to 110 villages, he recalls that the foundation stone for the project was laid by Mr Siddaramaiah as late as April this year. “Isn't drinking water a priority ? Lakhs of people are suffering without water and the government, which should have begun this project immediately on assuming office, has laid the foundation stone for it only recently,” he notes with regret.
“Laying foundation stones for a slew of projects at the fag end of a government’s tenure is like digging a well when the house is on fire. The government could have done more through a planned approach over the last four years. Now by the time the elections near we will have a few foundation stones and a city looking like a war zone,” dryly observes Mr Sridhar Pabbisetty, CEO of Namma Bengaluru Foundation.
Blaming the almost dead Metropolitan Planning Committee for the ad hoc projects popping up in different parts of the city, he says mini steel flyovers are being built without informed consultation with the people, resulting in infrastructure that Bengaluru can do without.
Look at the big picture first, instead of short term solutions
Seeing Bengaluru’s adhoc development, urban expert and founding president of the Citizens’ Action Forum (CAF), N. S. Mukunda, strongly believes that town planners need to change their approach and look at the holistic, larger picture instead of offering short term and temporary solutions for a city's growth.
“Town planners must have a vision for comprehensive growth of a city. For instance, they could develop the towns nearest to Bengaluru city like Devanahalli, Magadi, Nelamangala, Ramanagara, Hosakote and Kanakapura into satellite towns and link them with it through the Metro Rail, commuter train and improving the existing road connectivity,” he suggests..
“These towns could be provided with social infrastructure like schools, health care and entertainment facilities to make them self-sustaining like Whitefield which has most facilities, including offices. The Whitefield model should be emulated,” he adds.
In the long term, he suggests that district headquarters and taluks should be connected by the regular train services or the Metro Rail. “The existing railway tracks connecting some of the towns can be put to use efficiently through technology,” says the civic activist.
Urban expert, R. K. Misra agrees that developing satellite towns around Bengaluru is important to decongest it. “People prefer to stay in the outskirts for a better quality of life. But unless proper connectivity is provided developing satellite towns will be a total waste,” he warns.
Noting that a lot of development is taking place in Devanahalli currently thanks to the private sector, he says the government’s job is to focus on connectivity of such places. “I have suggested the government extend the Metro Rail to Kadugodi, Hosakote, Anekal and Ramangara under Phase 3,” Mr Misra adds.
Some of the projects which are under progress
Signal- free corridor work on Old Airport Road, Old Madras Road, Okalipuram and the Mysore Road to Central Silk Board stretch
Four- laning of the elevated corridor between Ejipura junction and Kendriya Sadan, Koramangala
Supplying Cauvery water to 110 villages
Under-bridge at Hebbal to ease traffic on Ballari Road
Metro Phase 2.
