Dug-up city, pedestrians’ nightmare
Road concretisation works in the city have been delayed or altogether abandoned by contractors, making walking a hellish experience
MUMBAI: The BMC’S grand programme to concretise over 400 kilometres of road across the city has not exactly been efficient, drawing the ire of citizens who complain that the haphazard digging has left no space for people to walk. The issue has been highlighted and brought to the civic body’s notice on social media, through letters and in a town hall meeting between authorities and local residents. All to no avail. The BMC’S only explanation is that since the utilities below the roads need to be replaced, the process takes time.
Citizens are not buying the argument, pointing out relatively minor projects that have been languishing for no apparent reason. For instance, D P Road 9, Powai, a key road in Chandivali that connects lakhs of Chandivali residents to JVLR, has been under concretisation for nearly a year now. The road is less than 600 metres in length. Mandeep Singh Makkar, founder member of the Chandivali Citizen’s Welfare Association (CCWA), pointed out that the road was narrow to begin with, and the inordinate delay in its concretisation was adding to citizens’ woes. “The work for such an important connector should have been prioritised and completed on a war footing,” he said. “Clearly, there is a lack of planning and seriousness in resolving the inconvenience caused to motorists.”
Makkar added that the contractor appointed by the BMC lacked experience in working in traffic-choked cities such as Mumbai. “Project information boards are missing, and barricades and CCTV cameras are nowhere to be seen,” he said. “All these are part of the agreement and need to be implemented.”
In Santacruz East, a road that was started after the last monsoon has been abandoned. “One side was completed and then the work was stopped,” said Gibson Rodrigues, a resident of Kalina. “The footpath either has missing manhole covers or there is construction material dumped on it. Hundreds of children from the three schools in this area have been forced to walk on the road.”
Rodrigues added that the roads in his area had not been swept even once after the road concretisation was done. “Senior citizens and children are the worst affected,” he said. “Many have developed allergies on account of the constant dust clouds. Since there are no municipal councillors for the last two years, citizens’ health has gone for a toss.”
The BMC, during its budget estimates in February, had stated that 397 kilometres of road were under concretisation. “This also includes utility ducts and laying utility cables to reduce frequent digging,” it had stated. The civic body had then said that concretisation works on 252 kilometres of road, including last year’s spillover, had been completed, and it was in the process of issuing tenders to concretise 209 kilometres of road in the coming financial year. The menace is not limited to the suburbs. Activists and local citizens complain that the incomplete concretisation works and missing traffic wardens are causing chaos in many parts of Dadar. “There are no proper barricades, manholes are kept open and there are no ramps for senior citizens,” said Chetan Kamble, founder of citizens’ group Chakachak Dadar. “There are no traffic wardens to manage traffic. The entire stretch is filled with dust pollution.”
Suryakant Naik, a food seller on Kakasaheb Gadgil Marg in Dadar West, said that not only was he losing business due to the constant dust clouds, it was becoming difficult for residents to even walk on the road. “Previously, the road was being watered daily,” he said. “But that too has stopped for a month now. The work has been left incomplete and there is no space at all for walking.”
A s e n i o r B MC o f f i c i a l explained that utilities below the road had to be shifted in the concretisation process, which was causing the delays. “For example, if there is a high-tension cable below the road, one has to find a way to lay it again,” he said. “Then there are water pipelines and other things that need to be shifted. This takes time. We hold joint meetings at the ward level to ensure faster coordination.” Dhawal Ashar, programme head of urban transport and road safety at the non-profit World Resources Institute, India, said that before concreting every stretch of Mumbai, be it entire carriageways or just side strips, utility works needed to be first undertaken by the BMC. “These works are almost all the time on the edges of the road; footpaths are demolished, making walking extremely difficult,” he said. “But in a city where more than half the travel is in the form of walking, the BMC needs to ensure that there is space to walk at all times and under every circumstance, like there is for automobiles. Priority needs to be given to pedestrians.”
A BMC official, when questioned, maintained that once projects were taken up, they did not need more than 45 to 60 days, and hence there was no need to create separate space for pedestrians. “The delay that is happening is because many roads have been handed over to a single contractor, leading to a shortage of labour at a few places,” he said. “With festivities like Holi and Ramzan ahead, when workers go back to their villages, there may be a further shortage.”