[sustran] ‘Garden city is risky to walk’

[Vinay Baindur]

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 *‘Garden city is risky to walk’*

Considering that walkability and pedestrian needs amount to just 0.6 per
cent of the total budget of Bangalore in the next 20 years, it is not a
surprise that pedestrians are just not in the scheme of things when road
infrastructure plans are conceptualised

  * By Sahana Charan*
 * Posted On Saturday, August 20, 2011*
 [image: Out Standing] [image: Out Standing] [image: Out Standing] [image:
Out Standing] [image: Out Standing]

 Bangalore has been categorised as “risky to walk”. This is what Sudhir Gota
and Sameera Kumar found out when they did the study — Pedestrian at
Crossroads:A case study of Bangalore. “There is a lack of pedestrian
policies and political support that cater to the needs of pedestrians at the
national, state and local levels. Only few cities have a pedestrian policy
or even pedestrian master plan. A city like Bangalore has drafted a policy
paper for pedestrian movement in the Bangalore metropolitan region. The
policy paper and the comprehensive traffic and transportation study envision
a pedestrian mode share target of only 20 per cent by 2025. With such a
relatively small vision/target, the city may be planning for ‘poor
walkability’,” says Sudhir.


*In 2011...**
*It takes a mother carrying a small child as much as 10 minutes to cross the
road on Old Airport road at the bus stop near Diamond district. That’s
because there is no signal on that road, no zebra crossing and people have
to wait for natural breaks in traffic, which are very few and far-between.

The time provided for pedestrians to cross Bellary road (opposite Air Force
Station) is just 20 seconds while the waiting time is nothing less than 15
minutes.

At Khodays circle near Railway Bhavan, it  took seven minutes to cross a
road completely but lots of pedestrians were stuck in the middle of the
heavy traffic. The zebra crossings here are poorly planned — some end on a
fence on the road, with no way to get on to the footpath while some have a
traffic island on the other end.

At EGL Exit gate on Intermediate Ring Road, it took seven minutes to walk to
the other side of the road, even at the zebra crossing.   On Nandidurg road,
the duration of pedestrian green is 10 seconds but it takes close to 10
minutes to actually cross the road.

Moreover, they have to wait for two minutes 40 seconds before the next green
comes. The duration of vehicle green: 45 seconds. This place is signal and
divider free, busy, narrow and has bidirectional traffic.

At Sophia School junction, in one hour, around 25 people took the skywalk to
get to the other side of the road while 50 people crossed at the road level.
Elderly people and persons with disabilities found it extremely difficult to
climb up the stairs of the skywalk, considering it has 116 steps (58 and 58
down).

This is just a sample from the ongoing reality check that members of the
Hasiru Usiru collective — who started the Come, Cross the Road campaign —
carried out at important traffic junctions in different parts of the city.
And these numbers are testimony to how the pedestrian in Bangalore has been
relegated to the corner, side-stepped in favour of the omnipresent vehicles
on the road.

“A few months ago, we were conducting a protest at Jayamahal Road where
trees were being cut for widening and we noticed that the pedestrians were
extremely inconvenienced while crossing because of the heavy traffic. That
is when seven of us from Hasiru Usiru decided to do this exercise to find
out the problems faced by them. We have been getting various cross-sections
of people to cross the road at various points in the city and we found that
person may take anything between two to 10 or sometimes even 15 minutes to
get to the other side of the road. Even this they do at great risk to
themselves and for elderly and the disabled it is just impossible to cross
some junctions. Another problem is the bad condition of footpaths, which are
either uneven or encroached upon. In many places, people can’t walk becaue
of vehicles parked on the footpath. The problems are manifold,” says Sridhar
Raman of Come, Cross the Road campaign.


*NOT A PLACE TO WALK**
*Sudhir Gota works as a Technical Manager in the Clean Air Initiative for
Asian Cities (CAI-Asia) Center in  Manila and Sameera Kumar is a transport
researcher, CAI-Asia and over the past few years both of them, along with
their colleagues, have conducted studies that look at design standards,
Non-Motorised Transport (NMT) policy issues, done pedestrian interview
surveys and also conducted walkability surveys over 21 cities, one of them
being Bangalore.

The study revealed that walking environment in the city varies significantly
depending upon the location – areas where rich live generally have better
walkability. Public transport terminals and educational areas have worse
walkability. Majority of streets are not accessible i.e. no disability
infrastructure. “Walkability is not only about footpaths but also about
availability of crossings, grade crossing safety, motorist behaviour,
amenities, disability infrastructure, obstructions and security from crime.
Using the same money as required for constructing 1 km metro, one can, on
average, construct  350 km of new quality sidewalks! Why don’t we see good
footpaths in Bangalore – is it a rocket science? Is it lack of resources?
Lack of space ?  No demand? Lack of expertise?  I sometimes think that we
don’t see good footpaths because its too cheap. If it was expensive, there
would have been more support, “ adds Sudhir quite candidly.

Most city planners are still under the dream that flyovers, wide roads are
what make a ‘world class city’, while cities such as NY, London, Amsterdam,
Guangzhou after years of struggling with congestion, pollution have
implemented pedestrian-friendly measures and reaped the benefits.

“Our policies and their implementation have been favouring the motorists
with wider roads, signal free corridors, flyovers, skywalks, subways et all
without any scientific basis. Pedestrian mode share is invariably shown as
less than 10 % since studies forget that public transport and auto rickshaw
users are also pedestrians at some point in their travel, who account for
about 50% of the travel made! Subways and skyways are highly expensive and
are not friendly for people with disabilities, senior citizens and children.
Moreover almost all subways in the city are locked after dark as they would
become areas of anti-social activities,” says Sameera.


*WHERE ARE WE HEADED?**
*So are we going towards a future that shuts out the pedestrian ?

“Unless peoples’ attitude that the road belongs only to motorists, does not
change, pedestrians will have to risk their lives crossing the road. We need
to improve institutional arrangements and create dedicated institutional
support for pedestrians, develop mandatory complete streets design
guidelines, set stringent walkability improvement targets which includes
reducing pedestrian fatality and integrate walkability to improve city
plans,” adds Sameera.


*What walkability survey says
**»* Since the 1980s, the walking trips in Bangalore have been depreciating
fast — from 44 per cent it has come down to a meagre 8.3 %. » The biggest
gainers have been two-wheelers and cars.
*»* Bangalore also has high pedestrian fatalities — Pedestrian fatalities in
the city accounts for 44 per cent of all road fatalities.