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Double Decker Mayhem on RV rd - EC metro route
Written By srinidhi - 12 August, 2017
Bangalore Analysis BMRCL metro Metro Rail
Bangalore has borne the brunt of bad engineering when it comes to road works. Thousands of crores are being spent mindlessly on projects with no actual value. The flyovers projects are the worst of the implementations, there are very few bridges which have proved their worth. A recent report on that can be seen here:
http://newsx.tv/video/126195/it-s-time-to-rethink-on-flyovers-news9
But unfortunately the govt is moving ahead with more of these mindless monstrocities..where the city is still trying to move private vehicles than supporting mass public transport completely.
One of the crazy plans is for a double decker bridge on the Marenahalli road in Jayanagar. Here the RV rd - Bommasandra metro line is suposed to have a long road bridge also starting near the Ragigudda station. This is to be located at the Akka Mahadevi Park, which will be completely lost due to the construction. And so will the other park on this stretch next to AAB at Udupi garden junction. COnsiderable part of Jayadeva hospital will also be encraoched on.
All this for what? So that the public can eventually ditch the metro and drive their cars over this long 'flyover' to they work places ??
Yes, today Marenahallu road and Silk Board junction is badly plagued by traffic woes. One of the worst in the world. But to fix a traffic issue, the first logical step is to understand what is the demographics of that particualr place. The time when the congestion is the highest and what constitutes road traffic there. It can easy to see that the office commuters moving from south towards HSR/ORR and Electronic city constitute a major part of the traffic there and the metro is the solution for them.
Metro has to made the ONLY solution for the commuters there
There are 3 major metro interchanges coming up on this stretch separated by just 1-2 kms:
- RV road - with Green Line
- Jayadeva - with Gotigere line
- Silk Board - with ORR line
This will practically make the marenahalli section (Jayanagar/bsk/JP ngr/BTM/Madivala) the best connected region by mass public transport. Rest of Bangalore also will find connections to get to EC and ORR through this. This is the best that anyone can ask for. SO then what is the need for the road bridge there??
Let us not over engineer and make a mess of the situation. Road capacity augmentation has not helped anywhere. Not building the road bridge will also spare a lot of money which can be used for metro or other useful purposes. Hope sense prevails!
There was a time the earlier BMRCL MD when asked about roads around metro..had said that BMRCL is only there to run trains. I wish that could remain just that for the good of all!
COMMENTS
srinidhi - 5 September, 2018 - 16:32
BMRCL received only a single bid for the SB road interchange tender apparently..
more here
Atleast this should prompt to stop the works and redesign the approach.
The route to EC on hosur road is getting a metro line hence there is no specific need to have that huge interchange at all. So is metro on ORR going to decongest Silkboard jn.
Two important metro lines will surely change the traffic scenario on its own. There is no need of any bridge or interchnge at all..for the least the road connections will lead to tremendous pollution and will need to be avoided at every cost!
Naveen - 6 September, 2018 - 13:11
In your first post, you say:
Metro has to made the ONLY solution for the commuters there
In your second post you say:
ORR section can be made signal free from Jayadeva to Silkboard.
Aren't these statements contradictory?
ORR is a six-lane road throughout. Only the BTM section is 4-laned & this is why it has so much of traffic pile-ups. While generally it is accepted that road expansion induces more traffic, it is also necessary for every city to have a good road network.
This being the scenario, it is correct to have an elevated road-cum-rail viaduct as there is no scope on surface to six-lane the section. The section from Jayadeva to RV Road needn't have an elevated road section but they may have gone for it because the section from Jd-mara to Sarakki junction also has just 4-lanes. So, some of the traffic may use the Marenahalli rd up to RV rd & others may use the road via Jd-mara, thus splitting the traffic.
Generally, "overflows" from roads normally take to metro & loads between roads & metro balance out. If there is too much of traffic congestion, people tend to move to metro & if metro crowds are excessive, they take their own vehicle or shift to bus.
srinidhi - 6 September, 2018 - 15:10
All for signal-free ORR..
Delmia jn in JP ngr has a flyover...only if BMRCL/BDA could have planned a road intervention at Sarakki jn to make it signal free during metro construction..then we would have had a major radial (Kanakapura rd) and ORR traffic seamless there..
Thats a missed opportunity. Hoewever hope they dont repeat the same at JD mara jn and Jayadeva..btw havent seen any plans on that front as yet..
ORR is 4 lanes only at most places in south blr and short bridges and underpasses at junctions should work best..
About metro traffic, all I can say is it is best way for daily commutes and needs to be encouraged in such a way as to make it the only viable option and long road bridges on the same pillars will not help with that.
Naveen - 7 September, 2018 - 05:10
ORR is 4 lanes only at most places in south blr and short bridges and underpasses at junctions should work best..
No, they won't. Traffic from a six-lane road on ORR cannot be squeezed into 4 lanes just in south Blr, which is why they are building road-cum-rail flyover.
When tier-2 cities like Jaipur & Nagpur with less than one-third population & probably less than one-sixth road traffic are building them at critical points, what is the big problem if they build one in Bengaluru that has serious transport problems?
About metro traffic, all I can say is it is best way for daily commutes and needs to be encouraged in such a way as to make it the only viable option and long road bridges on the same pillars will not help with that.
Long road bridges on same pillars is the only way to remove deficiencies on ORR in the absence of space below. All anomalies & kinks must be removed & ORR streamlined. They did Nayandahalli & they are doing BTM now. Next would be Silkboard & KRPuram when ORR metro line is done.
And no one denies that public transport must be encouraged.
srinidhi - 17 April, 2018 - 21:55
As discussed above Marenahalli road is slated to become the best connected section for mass public transport solution in the whole of the city, with 3 major interchanges in short distance apart.
However there are some road related interventions also needed..
1. Underpass at 11th main Jayanagar (RS Mutt)
2. Bridge at Jayadeva
3. Bridge at Udupi Garden Jn
With the last two, the ORR section can be made signal free from Jayadeva to Silkboard. Silkboard jn will automatically get de-cluttered with public moving to the metro.
So its high time we stop the insane plan to over engineer solutions and spend precious resources on unwanted and harmful plans!
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