Why infra makes me infra-red
The ‘I’ phrase is ego phrase. Sure, we’re constructing infra for a greater tomorrow however, hey, it’s screwing up at this time. Plus, undertaking pe undertaking repeats that previous track, ‘Manana, for to-morr-row nev-er comes.’ Mahapolis Mumbai has most swag-brag. ‘Coastal’ marvel is the Colossus of Roads. But our new engineering wonders principally join the ‘connected’. For teeming aam janta, infra creates extremely trauma. Monorail has swallowed half the carriageway, pushing pedestrians to the brink. Except Super Sreedharan’s Delhi, metro development all over the place has led to wholesale destruction of bad-enough roads. Does Viksit Bharat must seem like Niradbabu’s ‘Thy Hand, Great Anarch’? Could this futuristic god present some consideration for us poor sods who must dwell within the current?
Mumbai’s Brit-era-but- still-doughty Delisle street bridge was declared unsafe, torn down, missed a number of deadlines and eventually reopened after 5 agonising years. Now simply months later, neighbouring Elphinstone bridge is to be closed for reconstruction. Both serve frenetic Lower Parel biz district. The Legoland of economic and residential tower blocks, the tsunami of commuters, are all a-tremble in panic. Why?
Delisle bridge’s closure (together with an inexplicable six months earlier than dismantling really started) had meant killer wait at Elphinstone bridge crossing. Now former is to be the detour throughout latter’s shut-off. But new Delisle is already loaded to capability. The different mandated diversion, Dadar’s Tilak bridge, is worse-jammed and absurdly longer. ‘Estimated completion of Elphinstone in two years’? Ha-ha-ha!
Traffic – and commuters – will proceed to snarl much more murderously now that Ms Sitharaman funds reward horse will nightmarishly multiply two/ four-wheelers. Call me Luddite, however distance-slashing highways solely encourage extra personal automobiles when what we want extra of is auto-immunity, public transport, upkeep of present infra. Bullet prepare? Wow! But the morning after Budget wah-wah, Mumbai Mirror front-paged the woeful state at and round our stations. When will infra get its DeepSeek second? Smaller, cheaper shining the sunshine on huge and exorbitant.
Mumbai’s biography is Katherine Boo’s ‘Behind the Beautiful Forevers’. It’s dystopian to brush visitors underneath the flyover-carpet, leaving the lowlier beneath to battle with insane chaos. To facilitate extra vehicular visitors with out clearing roads narrowed by laissez faire encroachment, and monster SUVs. To make method for swanky ‘sky villas’ by bulldozing horizontal slums and shoe-horning their displaced dwellers into alienating and far-uglier vertical ones.
Battery energy is but to assault IC engines, which means persevering with carbon footprint, rising seas. Vehicle growth can also be weak Mumbai’s dying warrant. Biggest car-patron coastal street will likely be first to go underneath.
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Alec Smart mentioned: “Budget menu for poll-bound Bihar – ‘makhana board’ for BJP; litti choke-a for opposition.”
Disclaimer
This article is meant to convey a smile to your face. Any connection to occasions and characters in actual life is coincidental.
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