Buses, rickshaws will live in harmony

NEW DELHI: They say if you want to get a feel of the populous country that India is reputed to be, you should visit the Old City area around Red Fort and Jama Masjid. But MCD now proposes to induce some method into the madness that traffic in the Red Fort-Jama Masjid corridor is.
The corridor was reportedly identified for restructuring in a high-level meeting chaired by Delhi chief secretary, given its tourist value."Initially, the re-haul was due for the two-kilometre stretch from Daryaganj foot over-bridge to Lothian bridge, near Old Delhi railway station. But on Thursday a decision was taken to extend the plan up to Delhi Gate, increasing the project area to 3.5 km," said MCD commissioner Rakesh Mehta.
Public transport is one of the key thrust areas of the plan. Heavy and light vehicles, motorised and non-motorised vehicles and pedestrians will all operate in designated spaces. Buses will operate in the middle of the roads in designated lanes that will be segregated with mountable concrete medians. Specially designed bus-bays will be created where passengers can board buses and disembark.
"Netaji Subhash Marg will need some major engineering in front of Jain Mandir. The road on the Jain Mandir side is much higher than the one on Red Fort side," said architect Pradeep Sachdeva, who has prepared the proposal for redeveloping the area.
According to transportation expert Geetam Tiwari, the plan for HCBS foresees and provides for problems in the Daryaganj stretch where the road is merely 20 m wide. "We are narrowing down the width of car lanes to 4.75 m here, instead of 6.5 m in the rest of the corridor. Bus shelters will also be narrower. The idea is to discourage the use of cars in Daryaganj. Cars will have to take a detour via Ring Road from Delhi Gate," said Tiwari. Tiwari is part of the team that has charted the HCBS pilot route from Ambedkar Nagar to ISBT Kashmiri gate, work on which is scheduled to start in mid-February.
The plan also envisages an underground parking in front of Red Fort for cars, while lorries, buses and trucks that visit the area can park on the surface. "At night the space can be used by tourist buses that choke up traffic," said Sachdeva.