Journalism of Courage
A day after the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) proposed grade separators in place of flyovers at key junctions in the city in the civic budget on Friday,the Central Institute of Road Transport (CIRT) said grade separator is an equally costly option,if not costlier than flyovers.
The CIRT is the nodal agency that works on improving efficiency and productivity in the transport sector. The agency said a grade separator separates the uniform road into different grades or levels and entails higher costs with separate corridors created for each road.
CIRT director R Balasubramanian said even as civic bodies are planning traffic management solutions considering a time span of 5-10 years and the increase in traffic volume,grade separators will definitely be a costly option.
The civic body has to decide on this option considering the volume of traffic at that junction. The traffic flow,the future growth of the area,if it is an industrial area or connectivity to airports,railway station and so on have to be kept in mind if this solution has to be considered, he said,adding that unless a detailed study is done,the economic viability cannot be judged.
In 2001,the CIRT had submitted a report to the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation suggesting construction of only two flyovers one at Ganeshkhind Road and the other at Shankarsheth Road. While those two flyovers have been constructed the traffic density has grown manifold over the decade.
The CIRT feels that grade separator is one of the last options for addressing the traffic situation at a traffic junction. It is an expensive proposal. There are many low cost traffic solutions that have to be considered and only after a thorough study can a decision be made on how to tackle traffic at a given location, said a senior officer at CIRT.
The Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC) that has three grade separators on the Pune-Mumbai highway has put up the cost around Rs 75 crore. Municipal Commissioner Ashish Sharma said one cannot plan a grade separator merely on the basis of its cost. Depending on the roads and the necessity,one can plan a grade separator. We have flyovers at some junctions and a grade separator was put up on the highway after a detailed study by a consultant, Sharma said.
However,divisional commissioner Dilip Band who was PCMC chief at the time when the grade separator was cleared said this helped reduce cost by 30 per cent. About Pune he said there are certain junctions that can have part grade separator and part elevation. A proper study has to be done for these areas, he said.
Nearly 10 flyovers have been proposed in the city. The cost estimate for two flyovers at Juna Bazaar and Yerawada is Rs 22 crore and Rs 77 crore respectively under Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) funds and have been mentioned in the 2010-11 budget proposal.
Whether it is the flyover or the study to review grade separators,there is a need of huge funds, he said. And that is the reason why there is no talk about the other eight flyovers even as other cities like Mumbai is going full speed with flyovers and other traffic solutions keeping the future needs of the city in mind.
