‘Chandigarh will soon collapse under its own weight’

Ask anyone going to Shimla,or even Kalka,or all those who have set up an industry in the Baddi-Barotiwala belt and their answers are bound to shock you.

The infrastructure en route the area has already collapsed — and it was the edict of law that forced the sleeping government to wake up and react.

For commuters on the Panchkula,Chandi Mandir or even Manimajra route,it takes about an hour to travel a small distance of 10 km.

The problem is that we are blissfully blinded to any problem till the time we are in the thick of things. And then starts the blamegame and the “crisis management” system.

Let’s take up the transportation issue
Any city as populous as Chandigarh needs at least 60 to 70 per cent of its transportation needs to be met by the urban mass transit. But does it work that way?

When did you last take a bus to work,shop or for just plain travel?

Every trip costs the nation (and you) several litres of precious hydrocarbon fuel. Multiply that by a million and you can calculate for yourselves how much fuel and energy is wasted in getting just one single decision or signature on a file or an application.

How does almost half-a-million litre of petrol and diesel consumption in the tricity sound? That’s almost five lakh litres used up every single day.

A million litres every second day and that’s about Rs 400,00,000 worth of fuel being burnt every second day.

Interestingly,that’s in only one town out of the thousands in this country.

The status of public transport
The noisy,smoke spewing,rattle-boxes that we know as buses. It’s never there when you need it. And when it is available,the heat,humidity and stench make it an unforgettable experience. They are difficult to board if you are a geriatric or even a kid. Leave alone those who are handicapped.

We need to save on energy and use CNG or other hybrid technology that cause less pollution. We need a high capacity bus— with a trip time of just a few minutes to traverse the 10 to 15 kms. This bus should get priority signalling and preferably its own dedicated lane that is free of motorbikes,scooters and rickshaws.

A trip time of 10 minutes one way means a waiting time of one minute only if there are 10 buses on that route. There are only 16 V3s in the city and any intelligent businessman will gladly invest in these buses.

Imagine the fuel we would save along with precious foreign exchange. More importantly,imagine how much it would improve the energy situation of the nation. We need the will and the managerial capacity to put this in practice.