ROAD WIDENING SCHEMES OF BENGALURU: IMPACTS AND ALTERNATIVES

HASIRU USIRU

&

Environment Support Group ® 105, East End B Main Road, Jayanagar 9th Block East, Bengaluru 560069 Tel: 91-80-22441977/ 26531339 Voice/Fax: 91-80-26534364 Email: esg@esgindia. org or esgindia@gmail. com Web: www.esgindia. org

CIVIC #6, Kasturi Apts, 2nd floor, No.35/23, Langford Road Cross, Shanthinagar, Bengaluru 560025 Tel: 2211 0584 / 41144126 / 2271 1001 / 98803 97401 E-mail: civicblore@gmail. com Web: www.civicspace. in

Alternative Law Forum No 4 Ground Floor 3rd Cross, Vasanthnagar Bengaluru 560052 Tel: +91- 80 – 22356845 Fax: (Fax)+91- 80 – 22370028 Email: alforum@vsnl. net Web: www.altlawforum. org

Cordially invite you

to attend the

PUBLIC CONSULTATION

on

ROAD WIDENING SCHEMES OF BENGALURU: IMPACTS AND ALTERNATIVES

Date: 20^th December 2007, Thursday Venue: Senate Hall, Central College, Bengaluru

Programme

Display of Road Widening Scheme Drawings: 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM

Discussion on the Scheme: 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM

The Chief Secretary, Government of Karnataka and Members of the Bangalore Metropolitan Land Transport Authority are expected to actively participate in these proceedings.

Background note:

Known and recognised as the Garden City, a positive distinction of the rare kind, Bengaluru’s landscape is defined seasonally by the blooms in its tree lined corridors. Unfortunately, the fast changing dynamics within the city along with a burgeoning population and unplanned ‘development’ has led to the often illogical and ruthless removal of these trees. Hasiru Usiru (HU), a network of concerned citizens, has over the years endeavored to work towards finding creative means in which to conserve this identity of the city.

The group has evolved from a loose informal group to one which is now recognised and appreciated for its interest in different aspects of the city’s environment and social justice concerns. The Hon'ble High Court of Karnataka decided on a PIL filed by Environment Support Group in 2005 (WP No. 14104/2005 (GM-PIL) against such indiscriminate tree felling, that all decisions relating to protection of trees or according permission to fell them would be per the Karnataka Preservation of Trees Act. The judgement also vitally recognised the positive involvement and deep concerns of the public in such processes and highlighted that the Hasiru Usiru network should be involved by the government in all its decisions on projects where trees were to be felled.

The current issue:

It had come to light in the last few months that the BBMP has been planning to undertake a major Road Widening scheme to accommodate the growing traffic and to deal with the congestion in the city’s core areas. This would lead to the felling of thousands of trees within the city along with the removal of existing road infrastructure -not to mention affecting a wide number of open spaces and private properties. In addition there are a range of concerns relating to rights of pedestrians, cyclists, the elderly and the physically challenged, children, pavement vendors, etc. To summarise, the scheme would result in a drastic and irreversible change in the landscape and environment of the city.

Concerned about the logic of this decision, network members approached the Chief Secretary, Mr. Mahishi, on 19^th October 2007 with the request of a more public and open process of decision making. The outcome was a larger discussion with the Bangalore Metropolitan Land Transportation Authority (BMLTA) on the 30^th of November 2007 regarding the management of the city’s growing traffic congestion issues. Sadly, while the discussion ranged over a wide variety of topics with the mention of various internationally recognised and lauded methods of managing traffic in urban conglomerates such as charging cess on personal vehicles, increasing public transportation facilities, etc., no concrete decisions resulted from this meeting.

Recognising the need for urgent action, it was felt that a Public Consultation regarding the scheme would not only benefit the public through a larger dissemination of information, but would also lead to a process which identifies the vitality of the citizens and their participation in their own city’s management.

Organisers:

Environment Support Group is a registered non-profit public interest research, training, campaign and advocacy initiative working on a variety of social and environmental justice issues.

Citizens Voluntary Initiative for the City- CIVICs primary mandate is to generate and disseminate empowering information to the citizens of Bengaluru and to activate and mobilize participation of the local people in the planning, administration and management of the affairs of the Local Authorities.

Alternative Law Forum (ALF) recognises itself as a space that integrates alternative lawyering with critical research, alternative dispute resolution, pedagogic interventions and more generally maintaining sustained legal interventions in various social issues.

HASIRU USIRU

&

Environment Support Group ® 105, East End B Main Road, Jayanagar 9th Block East, Bengaluru 560069 Tel: 91-80-22441977/ 26531339 Voice/Fax: 91-80-26534364 Email: esg@esgindia. org or esgindia@gmail. com Web: www.esgindia. org

CIVIC #6, Kasturi Apts, 2nd floor, No.35/23, Langford Road Cross, Shanthinagar, Bengaluru 560025 Tel: 2211 0584 / 41144126 / 2271 1001 / 98803 97401 E-mail: civicblore@gmail. com Web: www.civicspace. in

Alternative Law Forum No 4 Ground Floor 3rd Cross, Vasanthnagar Bengaluru 560052 Tel: +91- 80 – 22356845 Fax: (Fax)+91- 80 – 22370028 Email: alforum@vsnl. net Web: www.altlawforum. org

Mr. P. B. Mahishi, IAS

Chief Secretary

Chairman,

Bangalore Metropolitan Land Transport Authority

Government of Karnataka

Bangalore 560001

12^th December 2007

Subject: Request your participation in a Public Consultation on issues involved in the ongoing and proposed Road Widening Schemes in Bengaluru; 20^th December 2007, Senate Hall, Central College, Bengaluru (5.00 pm – 7.00 pm)

Dear Mr. Mahishi,

As you are aware, as part of the Hasiru Usiru network hundreds of groups and individuals have come together to voice concerns over the careless felling of trees and irrational approaches adopted in executing traffic management and decongestion programmes in Bengaluru. This effort has been going on for three years now. As part of this process we have been systematically following up with every initiative of the Government and its various agencies, to ensure that Bangalore's true heritage, its tree lined streets aren't sacrificed due to short sighted planning and execution of works, and in responding to the demands of vested interests.

In this regard, several of us who are part of the Hasiru Usiru network came to a meeting held under the aegis of Bangalore Metropolitan Land Transport Authority (BMLTA) and chaired by you at Vikasa Soudha on 30^th November 2007 to discuss many connected issues relating to the ongoing road widening schemes in Bengaluru.

We were very happy to notice that the representation in the meeting was from the highest levels of all the connected government agencies. However, it disturbed us a great deal that there was no coherent strategy visible in the various proposals made by the different departmental heads, thereby leaving us to believe that the Government had no clear vision or clarity on how to approach the problem of traffic congestion and promote solutions that were reasonable and achievable.

We were also very disappointed that the meeting had no effective result even when we made clear proposals and repeatedly appealed to you to initiate steps of engaging in a public dialogue for finding appropriate solutions, rather than merely resigning to widening roads at enormous public investment, total loss of the city’s character, displacing unnecessarily hundreds of livelihoods, causing needless agony to pedestrians (especially the elderly, children and the infirm) and losing Bengaluru’s irreplaceable heritage – its wonderful trees.

Following this meeting, we have continued to deliberate on the importance of a evolving a rationale approach for managing Bengaluru’s traffic, an approach that would serve reasonably everyone’s road usage needs without sacrificing altogether the city’s quintessential characteristics.

In this context, we were invited by the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike’s Chief Engineer (Road Widening) and Tree Officer to a meeting that was held on 6^th December 2007. The purpose was to discuss ongoing and proposed road widening schemes. In this meeting we stressed the importance of engaging with the wide public and identified the importance of BBMP sharing first and foremost its proposals for road widening and engaging in a process of dialogue so the result could be rational and long lasting. In response the BBMP officials shared with us the road widening designs for some principal roads and we realised that this is a massive and mega project and requires a lot of transparent deliberation and input of ideas.

These drawings have now been widely disseminated by us and several residents of Bengaluru have printed them out and begun field verification of the impacts of this scheme. Such a detailed examination is being guided by experts from various disciplines and the results are to be disseminated to directly affected communities and the wide public, with a view to arrive at solutions that are not short-term, viable, serving the general needs of the community and without sacrificing the city’s heritage.

To discuss these findings and examine various alternatives, we have organised a Public Consultation entitled: “ROAD WIDENING SCHEMES OF BENGALURU: IMPACTS AND ALTERNATIVES”. This Public Consultation will be held under the aegis of Hasiru Usiru and the principal organizers are Environment Support Group, CIVIC and Alternative Law Forum. The consultation will be held on Thursday, 20^th December 2007 at the Senate Hall, Central College, Bengaluru University, between 5 pm and 7 pm. Participants will be well informed on the implications of this scheme and will be drawn from a range of communities, sectors, expertise and the media.

We request you to participate in this Public Consultation and share your views and feedback to the presentations that will be made. We also request you to invite all members of the BMLTA to participate in this Consultation. The wide public of Bengaluru will deeply appreciate such active participation from key functionaries of the Government as a sign of active responsiveness to their concerns on the current state of affairs and futures of their city.

We understand that this is really very short notice to seek your engagement in this process, but we are constrained to do so as the BBMP officials indicated to us that road widening schemes are to be implemented immediately. Thereby, we look forward to your confirmation in this Consultation with much hope.

Thank you for your cooperation and support.

Yours sincerely,

For Hasiru Usiru

Leo F. Saldanha Coordinator Environment Support Group

Kathyayini Chamaraj Executive Director CIVIC

Jiti Nichani Core Member Alternative Law Forum

Cc: All members of the BMLTA