Richmond Circle flyover: A plan gone awry

Double Road (officially Kengal Hanumanthaiah Road) is the major thoroughfare that connects most of South Bangalore to the Central Business District. While Double Road by itself is wide enough to handle even today's traffic, the last mile that connects Double Road to Richmond Circle, Lalbagh Fort Road, is extremely narrow, only about 60 ft wide. When traffic began exploding in the late 90s the pile ups on this road became extremely common. And thus was laid the ground for Bangalore's second flyover.

The one-way flyover opened for traffic in late 2001. It had two up ramps from Mission Road and Double Road which converged and stretched over the Lalbagh Fort Road to split into two down ramps, one each on to Richmond Road (officially General Thimmaiah Road) and Residency Road (officially Field Marshal K M Cariappa Road). Traffic on the narrow stretch below remained two way with one half devoted to traffic from Double Road/Mission Road on the surface which was allowed access only to Raja Rammohan Roy Road via a free left turn at Richmond Circle while the other half was meant for reverse traffic flowing from Residency, Richmond and Raja Rammohan Roy Roads towards Double Road. Traffic originating from Mission Road and Double Road had an easy ride into the city atop the flyover.

In the initial few months the flyover seemed like a boon come true but the design faults became apparent with traffic exploding into an entirely new orbit altogether in mid-2003. Volumes touched such highs that traffic flowing in the reverse direction, from Residency Road towards Double Road, which had to pass on one half of the already narrow Lalbagh Fort Road on the surface, began to pile up so much at the signal at the Olympic Sports junction (one end of double road - at the intersection of Mission Road, Langford Road and Double Road) that it would spill over across Richmond Circle obstructing traffic flowing on other roads at the junction.

To remedy this situation the signal switchover times were re-configured at Richmond Circle resulting in traffic being allowed to flow from Residency Road towards Lalbagh Fort Road for a mere 15 seconds and then put on hold for 120 seconds. This was meant to ensure that that traffic at the Olympic Sports junction would get cleared before the next lot began to flow in. Remember that traffic flowed on to this road also from Raja Rammohan Roy Road and Richmond Road albeit at considerably lower volumes than Residency Road.

Again things looked manageable for a few months. And then a combination of deteriorating roads, increasing traffic and abysmal road discipline threw things out of gear. Today traffic piles up so much on Residency Road at the Richmond Circle signal that it stretches as far back as Devatha Plaza which is about 500 metres away and on some days threatens to overrun the Cash Pharmacy junction, the previous signal. For some one who crosses the Cash Pharmacy signal, its a wait of 4 signal changeovers before he/she can get past Richmond Circle on to Lalbagh Fort Road. In all, it takes 12-15 minutes to cover a distance of just 300-400 metres. Things are set to worsen with two mammoth office buildings nearing completion (On the site where Khivraj Motors once stood is coming up Purva Premiere to be occuiped by software major Unisys; the adjacent land which was vacant for a long time is seeing a gigantic development) opposite the Bangalore Club on Residency Road.

What then is the solution? On the face it, converting the Lalbagh Fort Road into a one way allowing traffic to flow only from Residency Road towards Double Road seems like the way out. But it would cut off access for traffic from Double Road and Mission Road going towards Raja Rammohan Roy Road. This is the only approach point for traffic coming from this direction as i) Mission Road is a one-way from Corporation Circle to Subbaiah Circle (near Farid Motors) ii) access through Sampangiramanagar is impossible since Mission Road has a median and the up ramp of the flyover iii) Raja Rammohan Roy Road itself is a one way from the Mallya Hospital junction to Hudson Circle. In the event that this road is made a one way as set out above, traffic headed in this direction would have to take Langford Road, wind its way through Langford Town, get back on to Richmond Road and then head for Raja Rammohan Roy Road. This would worsen traffic on a narrow Langford Road and a Richmond Road that barely manages at present.

This where the designers of the flyover failed to anticipate future traffic scenarios. If the flyover design had included a down ramp on to Raja Rammohan Roy then Lalbagh Fort Road could have been made a one way. The up ramp on Double Road could have been wider since the traffic that presently passes on the surface towards Lalbagh Fort Road would have also taken the flyover and consequently lesser width being required for the surface lane. The body of the flyover is as it is 4-lane and wide enough to handle the additional traffic. What would have been a challenge is the design the down ramp since it would need to branch of at nearly 150 degrees to the down ramp on Residency Road. However it would not have been impossible to excute as the surface area at Richmond Circle is large enough for the ramps to branch out, and the landing point of that hypothetical ramp on Raja Rammohan Roy is also wide enough to take it. Besides something as sinewy as the Sirsi Circle flyover has been built.

Now one can only hope that the mobile flyover technology that the BDA is touting would help remedy the situation somewhat. But I don't see that happening since the existing flyover would need a lot of structural changes which might jeopardize safety. So, we are stuck with a concrete marvel that doesn't serve our purpose fully nor can be modified. This is all the more reason that the development agencies like BDA and BMP make public design plans for flyovers so that feedback from independent experts can be incorporated before such inflexible concrete monsters are erected.