This could be the story of an important street in any big town in India bursting at the seams. In Bangalore, it is the 100 ft Road (the city has a quaint way of naming streets) in Indiranagar where success, not failure, is crying out for a solution. A road that wide inevitably becomes an important artery and so is this one near where I live. But as its importance has grown so have the travails of crossing it, or going down it on foot or in motorised transport. Things have come to such a pass that the thought of a trip is often rejected if it means crossing the road in peak hours. This has cut the neighbourhood in two, drawing an international border akin to the line of control that divides one Kashmir into two.
This is a pity as Indiranagar is as nice a neighbourhood as you can find. Its leafy side-streets make for suburban quiet in the heart of town. The shops on CMH Road which cuts 100 ft Road at 90 degrees reduce shopping journeys to zero and the proximity to the heart of town (M G Road) makes things even better. This combination of creature comforts of suburbia and downtown makes many newcomers drop anchor there first and grow to love the city instantly.
But the inevitable has been creeping up on the place in recent years. Shops and small offices have arrived in an expanding flow and too many cars have come in their wake, clogging the side-streets, too narrow to hold them. The barely 200-metre long street, on which we live, has two software firms and one distributor’s dump before which pickups joust with cars for standing room. Sad as this has been, the municipality struck the final blow a few years ago by changing the zoning rules and declaring 100 ft Road a commercial thoroughfare.
That has brought in its wake a dazzling array of shops, hawking some of the best-known consumer brands across the world and a string of distinctive eateries. Furniture, both ornamental and minimal-modern, clothes, both ethnic and global, and of course, electronic gizmos of every kind are to be had for money if not love. And to complete the experience there is cuisine from Italy (Little Italy), northeastern frontier (Barbecue Nation), the continent (French Quarter), and of course, the self-evident fare of Mainland China and South Indies.
All this is fine but imagine the traffic that now clogs 100 ft Road. The cars of a growing number of shoppers inevitably land up on the pavement for which there is no ‘no parking’ sign. The walking space is under two more attacks. Bits of the pavements of this wide road have been carved out to make parking spaces. Plus, concrete slabs placed over little gullies connecting the roadside to storm water drains between the houses and the pavements have in many places given way, inviting you to stumble and break your leg. Wide pavements, bright shops and Bangalore’s pleasant weather should have made this a good street to walk any time of day. But it is difficult to cross, tortuous to drive down and treacherous to walk by. The hassles must already be losing the shops a good many customers whose number can only increase over time.
You have this unliveable urban chaos because collective sense eludes the street’s many stakeholders. What they need to do is sit down together, argue, haggle and eventually arrive at a composite solution acceptable to all. Its elements spring from common sense and must be known to many who have not come forward thinking you will never get everyone to agree on a package. But once the authorities are presented with one such agenda, they will find it difficult to say no.
At one end of 100 ft Road is a flyover with many loops. The rubble dump underneath these can host a large car park. At almost the other end of the road where it touches the upcoming metro rail is a large park. This can host a multi-storeyed underground car park over which can be laid a fresh new park. Once you get the two car parks all you need is a frequent shuttle round-robin bus service that can ferry passengers up and down the 2.5 km road.
Then the pavements can be restored and made pleasant to walk on. Over time buskers can make their music on these pavements and amateur portrait artists can entice you with their sincerity if not skill. On Sundays, you can even have a circus clown cheering up the tired children. And if wisdom truly dawns, the six-lane road can be made into a four- or two-lane one on which only buses can be encouraged to ply.
There is scope in every major shopping area in India for underground car parks over which can be rebuilt whatever existed there in the first place. The makers of Bangalore’s electric car Reva can gleefully supply the pollution-free shuttle buses. Then you can have the pedestrian shopping areas that now proliferate all over Europe. This can make everyone — shop owners, shoppers, local residents and municipal tax collectors — happy.
