Hyderabad,Bangalore and other 2nd tier metropolitan cities are facing similar problems and issues -which have been highlighted in this 2nd and concluding Part of the Article. Government and decision-makers need to take effective steps and ensure effective implementation mechanisms are in place...
Hyderabad,Bangalore and other 2nd tier metropolitan cities are facing similar problems and issues -which have been highlighted in this 2nd and concluding Part of the Article. Government and decision-makers need to take effective steps and ensure effective implementation mechanisms are in place...
Hyderabad,Bangalore and other 2nd tier metropolitan cities are facing similar problems and issues -which have been highlighted in this 2nd and concluding Part of the Article. Government and decision-makers need to take effective steps and ensure effective implementation mechanisms are in place...
Hyderabad,Bangalore and other 2nd tier metropolitan cities are facing similar problems and issues -which have been highlighted in this 2nd and concluding Part of the Article. Government and decision-makers need to take effective steps and ensure effective implementation mechanisms are in place...
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Part 2
Inner Ring Road who kya cheez hai? (continued)
HUDA undertook the land acquisition outside the MCH area since 1977, for 150 ft Right-of-Way and development of a median divided 6 lane carriageway along the Inner Ring road for a length of 26 km covering the eastern, southern and western part of the city. The balance of 27 km of the alignment was along the existing arterial road alignment and falling within the erstwhile Municipal Corporation of Hyderabad (MCH) Area- for which MCH was responsible for developing and maintaining the same. The situation within MCH area was worse especially on the southern side with the stretch between Santoshnagar and Chandrayangutta being as narrow as 60 ft. (now widened to 80ft -100 ft), while on the northern and western sector (Mettuguda stretch, Paradise-Begumpet-Greenlands- Punjagutta- Banjara Hills Road No. 1- Masab Tank- Humayannagar-Medhdipatnam) it was varying between 80 ft to 100 ft. There were no efforts to develop the Inner Ring road as a full-fledged arterial road along with service roads. In the absence of such status, gradually the Inner Ring Road became as one of the arterial roads with no distinction, hierarchy, etc. Regulation of land uses and zoning along the Inner Ring Road: Like all good intentions, the 1980 HUDA Master Plan specified Institutional Use all along the Inner Ring Road upto a depth of 500 metres on either side. But HUDA did not know what to do with this earmarking of land use or how to regulating the zoning/control of activities, etc. For a brief period in the 1990s it did take up continuous and massive avenue plantation outside the MCH area all along the service roads portions- which gradually and eventually disappeared with precisely ribbon- type developments (which the Master plan wanted to avoid and prevent through zoning regulations)- and horror of horrors, even encroached onto the Right-of-Way of the Inner Ring Road in the service roads portions. Within the MCH Area, most of the Commercial complexes that have come up- be it in Begumpet or Punjagutta or Road No. 1 Banjara Hills all have come up with case by case Change of land use change to commercial use. In 2001, the Government realised the futility of such an approach and brought out a comprehensive commercial streets Government order with levy of commercial use impact fees for 34 roads (later on list enhanced to 61 roads within the MCH area alone- practically every major arterial road becoming a commercial street-thus justifying the Corridor Model of economic development of the city ) in which the Inner Ring road (or whatever character remained of it) was one of the roads. Areas like Chandrayangutta, Santoshnagar, etc. did not bother about such zoning nuances. An important milestone in the development of the Inner Ring Road was in 2007 when the major portion of it (virtually the upper portion of the Crescent) was declared as one of the Metro Rail Corridor. Now we have a situation wherein instead of a city- bypass, the Inner Ring Road became a commutation corridor with the alignment and stations impinging upon the whatever was left of the 6-lane median-divided carriageway. The HMDA whilst planning the Outer Ring Road in 2003 envisaged a clear-cut hub-spokes and wheels structure of transportation network. It planned 34 Radial roads (spokes) between the Inner Ring Road (hub) and the Outer Ring road (wheel) while the Wheel is ready the hub and spokes are not. As if this was not enough, HMDA now intends to take up a Regional Ring Road of about 300 km with a 90 meters Right-of- Way forgetting the principle of Newtons Universal Law of Gravitation and thereby its effectiveness. Again HMDA has quickly forgotten that it proposed an Inner Circular Road of 30 meters (100 ft.) circumbulating the Inner City and inside the Inner Ring road and proposed 20 radial arterial roads between the Inner Circular Road and the Inner Ring Road (many of these becoming the Radial roads for the Outer Ring road. Why we cant develop the Master Plan roads to their full characteristics and potential: Or The Gang that couldnt shoot straight syndrome The story of the Ring Road is only one of the examples of faltering Master Plan implementation. There are other sectors like environmental protection, lakes protection, parks and open spaces creation and maintenance, public utilities , and housing that have similar shoddy stories in the Citys canvas. Indian cities lack the comprehensive approach to Master Plan implementation. We have too many actors, villains and directors in the urban panorama. Urban planning and development becomes a multi-starrer sans big-budget losing the pace and story-line in the process and being reduced to a masala entity of Great Urban Circus. It is no wonder that none of the metropolitan city civic authorities have a dedicated and full-fledged Master Plan Implementation Units or even Traffic and transportation Units which are the backbone of any city. 74th Constitutional Amendment law or smaller districts pale into insignificance before the masala entity of the Great Urban Circus.