Road widening is necessary once in a while for a growing city. But it is usually done without ignoring related factors like scientific traffic management, strict enforcement of traffic rules, traffic education of road users and acquiring extra land for
parking.
Parking problem is more relevant in Bangalore than traffic flow. For a citizen, driving out is indeed a nightmare due to lack of parking space. To my mind, road widening not backed by better road management and strict enforcement of traffic rules will not yield results.
For parking space, the BBMP must seek the cooperation of the largest tenants in the city — the armed forces like the Army and Air Force. They are sitting in prime areas with large chunks of land part of which could be given for meeting the parking needs particularly in central areas which are worst affected. The forces certainly have moral obligation to help the city administrators.
Bangalore’s roads are bereft of round-the-clock enforcement of traffic rules. The blame should be apportioned equally among the police, the BBMP and the road users. However much the Palike may widen or beautify the road, if the law enforcement agency is lax in its duty, it will become a futile exercise. Traffic police will be able to do better only if they are willing to extend their working hours till late hours as motorists prefer to look right and left and push off when cops are not around followed by free-for-all resulting in confusion.
BBMP should be made answerable to the congestion caused by their failure to enforce building laws and make builders provide parking space in private and public sectors. Such lapses result in congestion in the streets and lead to roadside parking which creates traffic bottlenecks.
BBMP and traffic police are duty-bound to ensure safe footpaths for pedestrians. The rights of pedestrians over the city roads and footpaths are cruelly snatched away by hawkers, vendors, cattle and overgrowing hedges which spill over from private compounds.
Strays and jay walkers are perpetual nuisance to motorists on city roads.
Mass awareness campaign on traffic discipline should be a joint job by the Palike and the police. People should be made to respect the law and develop a ‘pahle aap’ culture instead of the reigning ‘pahle mein’ attitude. An overseas visitor once jokingly jotted down in his travel notes that in Indian cities, especially in Bangalore, one must look to the left, to the right and to the centre and just zoom ahead wherever there is an opening. This state of affair must go.
As road widening results in displacement of families in crowded cities, the authorities must first think of appropriate alternatives to the affected and seek their cooperation rather than browbeating and confronting them. The present transfer of development rights (TDR) is impossible and unacceptable in Bangalore where small property owners make up the chunk who are likely to be affected.
Widening of road is an urban traffic management tool and it should be used sparingly and with care. The current manner of the Palike riding roughshod over others is wrong. It should therefore:
* Study the issue well.
* Seek the help of urban spatial planners.
* Solve parking woes, first.
* Declare proper compensation to those likely to lose their property
* Ensure a foolproof traffic management and make police accountable for it.
The writer is former commissioner of police in Bangalore City and currently vice-chairman of National Minority Commission
