thumb_up 0

COMMENTS

While it is true that "road widening doesnt always help!". But lets face it, our existing road infrastructure is definitely below the standards where it should be. I do accept that alternate public modes of transport available in Bangalore are grossly inadequate. But people should be encouraged to use public modes of transport. Apart from BMTC, there is not mass public transport system available in Bangalore. Putting rail lines definitely will take another 5 to 10 years. So atleast we should try to enocurage people to use the existing BMTC system. There are 2 problems facing BMTC now. i) Not enough services available ii) Takes too much time to travel from A to B. One of the solutions to problem ii) is road widening. Just widening of the roads will not help. City roads should be moulded in a way that they cater to all kinds of traffic and especially bicycle riders wherever possible. And also there should be proper classification of roads between highways and city roads. I believe Bellary road is a part of NH-7 and there is noway it should have entered the city, or the city around NH-7.

• thumb_up Like
• · login or register to post comments

bingo christopher!! right on the ball.

• thumb_up Like
• · login or register to post comments

we have seen this before..technology wise we moved to mobile phones much faster than the US which was still wondering what to do with all the pagers that they had with them.. similarly we need to identify and adapt to the needs of the hour.. Seoul's subway network was the most comprahensive one that one can see. http://hoonoong.compuz.com/bari/attach/1/1371168768.jpg It was discussed earlier in Praja itself. Even with that the above photo from their roads is a really alarming!

• thumb_up Like
• · login or register to post comments

The problem with Los Angeles is almost similar to Bangalore. Both cities have experienced very fast growth rates. In LA they have developed a very vast freeway network neglecting the metro rail/subway systems. Bus services are available but will take thrice as long as a car ride. I took a ride from USC in downtown Los Angeles to Arcadia near Pasadena and it took me 2 hours with two transfers. But a car ride would have taken me half an hour to 45 minutes at the most. Hence people prefer to travel on cars and the freeways are full of cars. While LA traffic is bad cosidering other US cities, it is a lot better when you compare it to Bangalore. The saving grace being the freeway system which is decent enough and constantly upgraded. A good rail/metro system would have reduced the road traffic problem in LA. Bangalore has a very minimal road network and zero rail system. And the growth rate it is experiencing is phenomenal. A lot needs to be done. We are at a stage where our infrastructure are 20 to 30 years behind. Bangalore has outgrown its infrastructure. Roads, metro rails, mono rails, BRT everything should come up. Road widening of course is one solution and just road widening alone will not help. If it stops with road widening, in no time the roads will be filled up.

• thumb_up Like
• · login or register to post comments

rock on sri!! awesome post.
here is some proof by example that 'you cannot widen your way out of congestion'.


jakarta


seoul


beunos aires

Most cities in the US have a stagerring 30-60% of the city area dedicated to roads and parking and they still have congestion.

All cities have a certain level of congestion irrespective of the level of public transport in the city. different cities have played with different percentages of pub trans infra to priv trans infra to achieve that level of acceptable congestion. boston is slightly road heavy,  nyc is metro heavy. but congestion levels are more or less similar. but it must also be said that cities like los angeles, atlanta and houston that are very road heavy have higher than average congestion levels. a respectable level of pub trans is needed to be near the averages.

but irrespective of the level of pub trans, a certain minimum level of road infra is needed for blr. what that is has to be directly addressed rather than all these circuitous debates on trees & pedestrians. if tree lined roads are bangalore's heritage then get very serious about it. acquire land for trees.
see either way we are spending money - directly or indirectly(burning petrol in jams). might as well do it, directly. my dream is 3x3 signal free roads, with half lane markings(to regulate autos and bikes) along all the arteries + orr + icrr with footpaths, magic underpasses for street crossing, bus bays and trees on the median. fix the minimum design standards and repeat them on all the above mentioned roads.

we can curse our autos, bikes, cycles and our heterogenous modes till the buses come home but it is also true that there is no city of the size of bangalore that does not have congestion, irrespective of what model the city has adopted or how homogenous the city's traffic is. theories based on nice and convenient fluid dynamics is fine, but our reality is completely different from those theoretical models and we need practical solutions to help palike engineers not ammo for inteligencia to diss hapless auto drivers, bikers, cyclists and walkers.

thanks
tarle

• thumb_up Like
• · login or register to post comments