Believe we should be asking Chief Minister Rane *WHY* the Konkan Railway
*Skybus* which costs approx Rs.45 crore per km; in other words, only two-thirds
the cost of the proposed monorail project, is not being considered. Land
acquisition, too, seems to be minimal with the *Skybus* project.
The difference is approx Rs.675 crore GASP
Lawrence
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See http://www.konkanrailway.com/website/ehtm/sky_bus.htm
A Statement of Responsibility Made in Public interest(In
Hindi)
(THE URBAN TRANSPORT TECHNOLOGY FOR THE NEW MILLENIUM)
The most precious asset in growing urban areas is the land. Allocation to
residential and commercial purposes put heavy pressures on land for public use
like parks and open spaces apart from very important and critical roadways.
Hardly 6% to a maximum of 18% of land in cities form roadways. The roadways once
laid- almost remain constant – at best- and may effectively reduce by
uncontrolled encroachments. The physical constraint of road area being constant,
as population increases, naturally loads on roads increase.
As more and more people from different habitats try to converge on to the
central business district, the road has no capacity to handle and congestions
erupt. Roads take one exactly to the point where one wants to go. But the
capacity is limited in terms of passengers per hour that can be handled. Even if
one considers only buses, need to maintain the braking distances between two
buses and the space maintained between them affects speed as well as limits per
lane what capacity can be achieved. When mass transit , that too at higher speed
is required, rail based systems only can handle.
Requirements of an ideal urban transport system:
Heavy concentrations of residential units coupled with required
movement to work places or to market places demand transportation of people.
Roads are to cater for the same. But roads have a limitation- the
area available remains constant, once the development is completed, and old
cities in particular throw up the problems of mismatch of designed capacity
versus the increasing pressure of populations.
Let us examine the various modes of transport that population uses
in a city and their capacities and limitations, to evolve requirements of urban
transport solution in a holistic manner.
Currently available solutions are either elevated railway or
underground railway if mass transportation is required:
Elevated railway technically cannot reach truly congested central
busy roads where the mass transport is needed. It is also too invasive and may
require dislocation of some portions of habitat as well as introduces noise
pollution.
Underground railway is less invasive on surface but still poses technically
challenging risks of fires and evacuations. It also has to address concerns for
foundations of heritage buildings.
If road vehicles are involved, in inter-modal transfers, it becomes
weak link in the chain of transport between walking and railway. Both modes
suffer from derailments and capsizing killing commuters.
Surface railway is impossible to lay in an existing city. But even
to lay the same in a new development, one should keep in mind what happens after
50 years of laying the same. We have living example of our own suburban system.
The city remains divided by the corridor and it is an eternal noise polluter in
the heart of city day in and day out. Sudden disgorging of heavy loads of
commuters at stations create need less congestion on the roads, reducing quality
of life. Almost close to 2000 persons die annually- because of trespassing or
falling from trains in our present system- whatever be the excuse and
justification for accepting the same. In addition vulnerable to minor vandalism
by urchins, but resulting in grievous injuries like losing sight for the
commuters. Again this mode cannot follow roads, so the weak link of road
vehicles has to be brought in for inter-modal transfers.
Derailments, collisions and capsizing concerns remain with loss of life for
all the above mentioned three systems.
The infrastructure created for urban transport is hardly utilized to 30 to 40%
capacity because of directional as well as inevitable peaks for limited hours
in a day. It has no other use and just idles.
An ideal solution is one which:
1. Follows the existing roads- but does not take road space- and be as
flexible as a bus
2. Have rail based mass transit capacity, same as existing rail metro
3. Does not divide city while providing integration along its alignment
4. Be derailment and collision proof- with NO CAPSIZING of coaches- so that
there can never be loss of life
5. Be free from vandalism
6. Noise free and pollution-free
7. Non-invasive -requiring the least amount of scarce land space- and not
come in the way of development.
Sky Bus technology as
