Mathura Road running out of breath
GASPING FOR FRESH AIR Choked roads, ongoing construction and nearby industries, have turned one of Delhi’s arterial stretches into a new pollution hotspot
gest share among vehicles at 46%.
A 2015 study by Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) revealed that on an average 85,799 goods vehicles enter and exit Delhi from the nine points daily. “The total number of trucks that enter Delhi spew close to 30% of the total particulate load and 22% of the total NOX load from the transport sector,” the report said. NOX or nitrogen oxide is among the major pollutants in city’s air.
The Ashram Chowk intersection records 429,000 vehicles every day and adding to this is a bottleneck on the Bhogal side. With the road getting narrower till Nizamuddin railway overbridge, traffic is bumper-to-bumper for most of the time. When the vehicles are idle and the engine is running, more pollutants are released, especially in diesel vehicles.
The stretch has been a nightmare for commuters over the past two years because of repairs and diversions. The ongoing Metro construction has also reduced available road space, triggering traffic snarls on Ashram Chowk and Mathura Road. “Mathura Road area is influenced by major traffic, including dieselpowered heavy vehicles, loaded vehicles, non-conforming vehicles and so on,” said Central Pollution Control Board air laboratory chief, Dipankar Saha.
OTHER FACTORS
Another contributing factor for the acute pollution levels on Mathura Road is the Badarpur Power Plant. Though closed now as part of the graded response action plan, it still has an ash pond spread over hundreds of hectares of land. During summers, high winds suspend the fly ash. Okhla Industrial Area and Okha landfill site also add to the foul air quality.
“Industries operating in Okhla phase II and III could be one of the factors for pollution , apart from traffic. If the monitoring station was at Ashram Chowk, the readings would be much higher,” Dr S Velmurugan, senior principal scientist, Traffic Engineering and Safety Division, CRRI, said.