If there had to be a showpiece of all the ills that a road widening project can possibly bring, think Suranjandas Road. For a road that is a vital connection between two of the busiest main roads in the city – Old Airport Road and Old Madras Road – its present state is a picture of disarray.
Deep pits dug up on either side of the nearly four-kilometre stretch not only proves to be a thriller of a ride for vehicle users, but has also cut off residents from using the road.
The risk
Satyavati M.S., a resident of HAL quarters on Suranjandas Road, says, “We are literally living on the edge. My daughter had gone abroad to study for a year and had parked her bike within the compound. She couldn’t take it out after she came back as they had dug up a huge pit right in front of the main gate. We finally had to coax some of the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) workers into covering it up so that we don’t have to risk breaking a bone or two when trying to get out of our homes.”
Accessibility is not the only thing that has been affected. The sluggish pace of work on the road widening project that started in July 2011 and has refused to see completion since has had rippling effects on other aspects as well. Phone and Internet connections, for instance, have taken a break. IT professional Chaithra H.A. said her BSNL landline connections had been “dead” for three weeks.
“And they have told us that it will take at least two months to restore. Our Internet connection was also through the landline. We cannot wait that long so I have applied for a data card from a private operator. We will also be disconnecting the BSNL line soon as there is no point paying the rent for months when we are not even using the phone,” she added.
If that is not enough, negotiating the dusty roads to reach the HAL hospital is a brave task for the patients. Making matters worse is that the service road that ends at the hospital has become an alternative for regular traffic to avoid the crater-ridden main road with muddy mounds that have settled down during the monsoon, making it an extremely bumpy ride or drive.
Target: teak park
To top it all, it is not just people who have had to bear with the long delayed project. Fully mature trees that made the area cooler than the others once upon a time have had to face the axe.
All eyes are now on the teak park maintained by HAL.
Though BBMP officials have promised that the park will not be touched, the guilt-free manner in which the tree-lined Suranjandas Road has been reduced to a dusty, barren stretch has unsettled old-time residents.
