Life on the slow lane

Life on the slow lane
The big-buck boom of the Hosur Road IT cluster has not quite translated into better living in the Bommanahalli neighbourhood.

Take this for a flip side. Many residents in the Bommanahalli Zone, sandwiched between their affluent neighbours in HSR Layout and Electronic City, are harried over the pace at which residential and commercial activity has flourished in the locality, with no infrastructure to match. The zone, which houses more than three lakh residents, is still seeing a surge in new real estate projects. The issue, however, is that the roads and other civic amenities are not adequate for this growth in resident population.

Near and yet away from the gated islands of residential prosperity, from the software technology parks and IT campuses of leading IT firms, away from the central city areas that comprise the pensioner’s paradise that the City once was, Bommanahalli presents a picture of unplanned urban growth and persistent official neglect, that have resulted in civic deprivation.

Just outside of HSR Layout Sector 7, in Mangammanapalya, the ride is bumpy as ever. “The roads have been in pathetic shape for a long time and when it rains, the entire area gets logged. To make things worse, effluents from a nearby garment factory are also being let out into the drains,” says Hanifa, who runs a bakery in Mangammanapalya.

Open drains and erratic garbage disposal are issues of concern, says Salim, a resident of Mangammanapalya. Imam, who also resides in the same locality, slams corporators down the years for having only managed to deliver empty promises.

Bommanahalli, one of the seven former City Muncipal Councils, has now come under the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike’s jurisdiction. It has a total of 31 wards, including the recently-added Konana kunte, Raghuvanapalya, Kot hnur and Chunch ughatta.

Neighbourhood rush
Surrounding areas, including Begur, have also seen a rise in real estate activity, making roads almost a default casualty of the development. Begur Road, which diverts traffic from Bommanahalli towards and from the nearby areas, including Bilekahalli, Kodichi kkanahalli and Vijaya Bank Layout, is a cratered stretch that continues to take large volumes of vehicular traffic. The road is not in for any immediate face-lift, considering that the area is virtually bustling with construction of residential apartments. Add ing to residents’ worries is the presence of wine shops and bars in many of the residential pockets.

The inroads that branch out of Hosur Road have all emerged into little residential pockets. This, coupled with extensive commercial activity, has meant more vehicles and more traffic snarls. And considering the new residential projects being advertised through the Bommanahalli stretch, the rush seems to have just started.

Ground Realities
*Home to many ITES firms, Bommanahalli bustles with traffic
*Traffic to Electronic City redefines chaos in the mornings
*Madiwala, the private bus hub in the neighbourhood, adds to the rush
*Increase in real estate activity in neighbourhood not matched with good infrastructure
*Corporators down the years have only delivered promises, charge residents