Flyover mania

With the monsoon eight weeks away, it is a race between the rains and 55 flyovers the government is trying to build at breakneck speed. An unbelievable number of north-south roads have been dug up either in furtherance of the ambitious flyovers plan or because they are being concretised.

One thing there appears to be no shortage of is cement concrete and builders willing to lay the stuff down. Money is a different matter. The flyovers are estimated to cost Rs 1,550 crore and it is a moot point whether the government has actually arranged all that finance. Judging by the huge deficits in the budget, raising that kind of money will take extraordinary effort and tax the imagination severely.

Is this what Mumbai really wants and needs? Surely not. But this cash-strapped government in its wisdom has chosen to do just that. It is an illusion to imagine traffic will be speeded up because of the flyovers. Once more people take to cars and more cars to the road, it will be back to the 15km an hour crawl whichprevails just now. So any which way one looks at the flyovers, they are not what Mumbai needs.