http://www.businessworldindia.com/MAR2706/indepth03.asp
Three to Tango No one transport system is enough to fix Bangalore's crumbling infrastructure. The city needs three Nelson Vinod Moses There is an ambitious plan to fix Bangalore's crumbling transport infrastructure. Ambitious, because it involves creating two new transport systems - a conventional metro rail project and an unconventional monorail project - and then meshing both into an existing network of 4,000 buses that run on 4,600 km roads. >> <Bangalore is willing to risk such an audacious plan because it is desperate. Its roads are already gasping - the city has the highest number of vehicles per lakh of population. About 900 vehicles are added every day to the city's 26.8 lakh vehicular population. As these fight for space on the arterial roads, average driving speed has already dropped from an estimated 20 kmph in 1990 to between 12-16 kmph at present. Bangalore's reputation as a world-class tech cluster is getting jaded because of its poor infrastructure (see 'Holding On'). > <There are indications that the monorail will be designed to support the Metro. But there seems to be no coordination between the Metro and the Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) buses, which currently services more than half of the city's transportation needs. But BMTC, rather than complement the proposed Metro, is seeking to compete with it. "BMTC is talking about its own transport system; it is talking about a grid system. We are not aligned like New York to have a grid system," claims Ramanathan. Bangalore's streets are circuitous and winding when compared to the more simpler grid formation of New York streets. In the future, Bangalore will have to live with a network of three main transport systems - metro, monorail and BMTC buses. If many transport systems have to co-exist with the Metro and complement it, four main issues have to be tackled: comprehensive connectivity, integration of various transport systems, affordability, and marrying urban development with transportation, says Ramanathan.> <But all that is still many, many years away. First, given the state of Bangalore's new flyovers, the government's ability to finish the project on time is suspect. The city is going to get a whole lot worse once the digging and construction begins. "We are in for chaos as the Metro is going into the heart of Bangalore. I have no faith in the (project's declared) timelines," says Ramanathan.> -------------------------- The hand-writing is right there on the wall, amigos! Dont say you have not been warned. Cheers.
