My ebook: Journeys with the caterpillar

My ebook
"
Journeys with the caterpillar: Travelling through the islands of Flores
and Sumba, Indonesia
" is available at
this link


Friday, September 23, 2005

Solving Mumbai's traffic problems

These are not roads...These are muddy pits for the toads. The rains have extended their stay for more than a month over their normal course. And there seems to be no respite for commuters in Mumbai. The highways have sunk down-ways. Flyovers look like parking lots at the most busy Wal Mart. And I haven't anyways dared travel in a local train for the last 2 years. As a result my usual 30 minute commute now takes 80 minutes on an average. It's tougher for the cab and rickshaw drivers- they get only 10-20% more for more than double the toil, their maintenance costs also skyrocket.
What's the solution? May be displacing and distributing CEOs. What- displace CEOs rather than slum-dwellers? I think much of the problem with Mumbai's transport owes can be boiled down to one factor-Concentration of business leaders and therefore businesses in south Mumbai. Other often cited reasons like the linear structure, low spending on infra etc. wouldn't have bothered us if offices were more distributed. Just distribute the CEOs all over Mumbai- their offices will follow, traffic will be more distributed, and roads and drains around their houses and offices will become better due to better lobbying. So, MHADA!- you know what to do.

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