Elevated highways to ease Delhi traffic
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, March 5
The Chief Minister, Ms Shiela Dikshit, said today that Delhi has more traffic signals than the rest of the country put together and if the traffic is to be controlled, advanced elevated highways are needed on the Ring Road.
She was speaking on the occasion of release of the ‘India Infrastructure Report 2004’. The Capital is one of the most densely populated cities in terms of vehicle population, she pointed out. Delhi’s traffic system was ‘’choking’’ the roads and the government was examining ways to de-congest the roads. ‘’The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation is a positive and development-oriented approach but it is not enough. The rate of traffic growth is much higher and if immediate steps are not taken, things will go haywire on the Capital’s roads.
Ms Dikshit said that high capacity buses and elevated highway were the two steps the government was looking at seriously as part of its plan to reform Delhi’s roads and check the unruly traffic. The Delhi government has already asked bus manufacturers Ashok Leyland and Tata Motors to start trial runs of the high-capacity buses they are offering. It hopes to take a quick decision on the issue.
The government was also contemplating going in for an elevated highway on the Outer Ring Road to take care of the massive traffic coming into the capital from the national capital region.
“We receive around 100,000 vehicles a day from the NCR region and these elevated highways, along with the existing roadways, will take care of this,” she said.
Ms Dikshit said that another problem for Delhites is water. A large amount of water is either being wasted or pilfered. As much as 40 per cent water is unaccounted for due to leakage. Also, she added, there was a disparity in the usage of water with the posh localities getting more supply.
There was no plan to privatise the Jal board as the government had done on the power front, she explained. Water is a basic necessity and it is the government’s responsibility to provide it to the people.
Ms Dikshit said waste management was another area of concern. “Delhi is one of the most densely populated cities in the world and there has to be a proper mechanism to segregate, manage and eliminate waste,” she added.