Indiranagar Project

------(Blue)-------> Left Lane 25 feet wide
------(Yellow)-----> Middle Lane 25 feet wide
------(Red)--------> Right Lane 25 feet wide
------(Green)----->Green Belt(L,R) 100 feet wide
----(Orange)-->Other Utilities(L,R) 50 feet wide
-----------------------------Total-225 feet wide
The Standard Underpass with Two one Way roads crossing each other.


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A Proposed Traffic Plan for Indiranagar Project

A revisit to an ideal Traffic flow concept

The guest may like to visit an earlier post of mine on Human Blood Circulation to guess what I am referring to as an ideal traffic flow. Taking the Human Blood circulation as an analogy, here we would like to obtain an uninterrupted flow of traffic devoid of any crossing. However we will restrict it to only the Arterial Road Network in the city of Bangalore and not to the entire road network, which may not be necessary, in practice.

The concepts are
1. One way Traffic is

a. ideal for connectivity
b. Efficient to manage
c. The inherent irritation is a manifestation of being unorganized.
d. Etc…..

2. Two way Traffic is

a. Inefficient for Connectivity
b. In efficient to manage
c. More Dangerous to Pedestrians to cross
d. Good for use inside communities
d. Etc…..

3. Business, Residential and Rural Communities Integration

a. Communities should be sized optimally on availability of suitable land for use
b. Existing Rural Communities should be developed “positively” not “intrusively”
c. Asian Communities in general and Indian Communities in particular are having an unfair population density and harsh economic conditions.
d. Etc....

4. Restrict access to the Arterial roads to an optimum level

a. Minimum one access per Arterial road
b. More for justifiable reasons
c. The basic concept being developed is that

Urban Development with zoning for minimizing traffic entropy

Urban Road Network Development is an important integral aspect of any urban development. The standards of construction of State roads are available with Indian Roads Congress at nominal cost by mail. However these standards seem to refer only to the civil construction of roads as such without referring to various other important civic needs of a community, with an urban reference, in particular. Praja who is actively engaged in improving the lot of mega city dwellers, is very conscious about bridging this gap.

Bangalore has experienced an explosive growth in a past few decades, which is chaotic and intrusive of rural land use. The type of development also known as vernacular type of development, in turn attempts to give a workable relationship between the urban and rural environments.

The zoning concept on the other hand, is a basic requirement important for urban development towards minimizing the traffic entropy. The entropy is a variable indicating the disorder of any system, and plays an important role in the second law of thermodynamics. The comparability between the environmental impact of urbanization and the thermodynamic entropy has been systematically analyzed, which has led to The Urban Environment Entropy Model. Thus the importance of zoning along with sufficient green belts cannot be under estimated.

The article on The Five Dimensions of compact city development evaluates the efficacy of five smart growth instruments in bringing forth compact urban development and nontraditional neighborhood design. The article first sets forth a set of quantitative measures that rationalize five dimensions of compact urban development and nontraditional neighborhood design:

1. Street network connectivity
2. Density
3. Land use mix
4. Accessibility
5. Pedestrian walk ability.

Using these measures, three study areas were evaluated to determine how well their urban development patterns meet smart growth principles. However, smart growth plans have not branched out into non-traditional aspects of planning to encourage mixed land uses and to improve regional accessibility.

Modern day cities in developing countries tend to become bigger and bigger as time passes. The size of a city depends on the land used for housing, Industries and the workforce, to keep the Industry going. The workforce in turn attracts additional support people, and additional land for use. The total area of a city is thus the land required for:

1.Industries
2.People
3.Public Utilities:
a)Parks
b)Malls
c)Busyness Centers
d)Transport Stations
e)Hotels and Restaurants
f)Schools and Collages
g)Road Network
h)etc.

In a growing city like Bangalore for example, bad road net work utilization and or bad traffic regulation could be disastrous.



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In the current blog, traffic entropy is visualized as a measure of wastage in fuel and time of total traffic participants on any given day in the life of a city.

It is proposed to restrict the area of interest of the city of Bangalore for simplicity to the area between 100 and 80 feet roads on one hand, and the CMH and 13th main roads on the other hand, as shown in the Google Map above. The area of interest as above will be analyzed for introduction of one ways, uninterrupted traffic on arterial roads, integration of Walk paths, cycle tracks and green belts etc, for presentation to the authorities for implementation.

This analysis post is Titled "A dream pilot project for a smooth flowing Indiranagar Traffic"

Restricting the right turn for improving traffic flow

The road traffic problems in Bangalore City are increasing day by day. The primary reason for the increase is the increase in Road Vehicles consequent to the increase in City Businesses in turn increasing the Population. This phenomenon is not Unique to Bangalore alone. The population in our country has grown from 0.40 billion in 1940 to 1.17 billion in 2008. The primary reason, for the increasing chaos in the road traffic, is this phenomenal population explosion.

Any road design is based on a given maximum traffic load. The load on roads can be reduced by having alternative mass Transport systems like Metro, Mono and suburban Rail systems. The design of the total system is in turn limited by the design total load.

Thus any city road system design can support a max load to which the road system is originally designed. Adding additional modes of transport can delay the ultimate load on the road system but can not avoid it.

It is important to understand this concept of “maximum permissible limit on total number of vehicles allowed in a city” will finally decide the limit on growth of any city, especially cities like Mumbai

Recently in a meeting with Bangalore City ACP Mr. Praveen Sood attended by a Praja team including me, expressed a view that it is the right turn that complicates the road traffic flow. This view of Mr. Sood sounds similar to that of the DCP of Pune.

A very active Praja in Pune is currently grappling with Banning Right Turns to Improve Traffic Flows proposal of its Deputy Commissioner of Police. The Pune author seems to be in confusion whether this move by the Pune DCP is scientific or other wise.

Any logical thinking conforming to known and proven scientific laws as of the day is scientific. Thus which is scientific to day could well be unscientific tomorrow, as the human knowledge improves by the day if not hours. Hence going by what we have discussed above, we have to consider logically the consequence of banning the Right Turn. The logic to be applied here is whether the gains achieved by banning the right turn are more than the losses due to the banning.

It looks like the Pune Praja is reconciled to the proposal of restricting the right turn made by DCP Pune.

Public Vs Private Transport

On September 1 2008, Abhishek Upadhyay wrote that “People should be encouraged to use Public Transport.” I was busy on “Praja” work consequently loosing some time on developing Bangalore on line.

Yes Abhishek that is number one priority for us in Bangalore for that matter the whole globe. This is because the development is taking place at ever increasing pace which is mind boggling. No design can cater for ever increasing number of private vehicles.

However there are several ways to handle the situation of incresed number of vehicles:

1. Have some roads earmarked for only buses.
2. Have dedicated bus lanes instead in all roads
3. Discourage private vehicles by introducing congestion tax.
4. Remove subsidy on fuel totally on private vehicles.
5. Have additional local exclusive Cycle / pedestrian Tracks.
6. Strict Zoning in the future Bangalore city development.
7. Move towards Zoning in existing areas of Bangalore
8. Go for multi modal transport including Metro, Manos and suburban Rail
9. No parking of private Vehicles on public land, including roads
10. Close entry of all residential area roads on to arterial roads, except a few.

Bangalore Traffic Woes, avoid ad hoc solutions please!

Bangalore, keeping in pace with other cities in the world, has grown exponentially over the past half a century. The Key question while planning traffic solutions for such a growing city obviously would be “how to account for possible future growth?” Bangalore has a very good example in the Kempe Gouda Towers. Kempe Gouda had in his wisdom estimated the boundaries of Bangalore and built the Towers known after him.

The lessons, what we in our time should learn are:

1 The boundaries of a growing city are not absolute. They will keep extending.
2 To take care of moving boundaries, the planning should be insensitive to it.
3 Such a methodology, insensitive to the boundaries, should solely cater to the current community traffic, without being affected by its future growth.
4 This requires a through analysis of the basic requirements of a community for (a) its daily needs and (b) its daily activities, at present as well as in the future.
5 The key now is to look forward for these requirements as and when they come up. This new requirements should be catered for without affecting what ever is on the ground.
6 Is such a design possible at all? Is there an example available from which we could draw some principles for such a growth tolerant design?

The examples are plenty in nature. A Tree for example germinates from a seed and grows being stationary at a location in huge proportion to its beginning. The whole blue print is incorporated in its seed for future Proliferation to newer locations. The Human being also grows from a few Kgs to his final mass in due course and so on.

Now coming to the current issue of Bangalore Traffic woes, it is required to address ourselves to Bangalore Traffic as a whole and not piecemeal to be specific. If we solve the problem at one junction the problem is transferred to the next junction and so on. Taking a leaf out of nature’s book there should be no hold up of traffic at all any where. The traffic lights should be made irrelevant. There should be no crossings in major roads at all. All major Roads should be one ways throughout the city. The city means that which is bounded by outer ring road. We should keep in mind this is a temporary assumption.

It is possible to make this model work. The additional incentive is if we make this model work for Bangalore it will be a unique experience in the whole world probably!

Road Map For Bangalore Traffic Optimization Initiative

The First Step is to set the goals both long and short term

The enthusiasm shown in Praja postings on Bangalore traffic was excellent. However there is every chance of not making any progress if we collectively do not agree and quantify to what are our:

1. Objectives/goals
2. Constraints
3. The methodology of solution.

These are simple issues which can be sorted out by public debate. The execution, onthe other hand has several pit falls like

1. Making a proposal plan publicly transparent
2. Objections and impediments by vested interests.
3. Opportunism by not so selfless people in different walks of life.
4. etc.
5. etc.

Let us first agree to what we mean by "The ideal Bangalore Traffic". To start the ball rolling,The ideal Bangalore Traffic means:

1. The daily consumption of transport fuel (carbon foot print) should be the minimum.
2. The total daily time of all the commuters in Bangalore should be the minimum.
3. The cost of implementing a master plan should also be the minimum.
4. Traffic hazards should be eliminated
   

Obviously there may not be one single solution for this problem. We can only have a set of "seemingly" best solutions. We can then choose any one from the available candidate solutions.
Your vote in this regard as shown along side at the top of this post, will be of valuble.
Happy Voting!

Function honoring the distinguished Octogenarians of IISc Alumina.

To day I attended the IISc meeting honoring senior distinguished Alumni. On arrival I handed over my two photographs at the desk, before entering the IISc Senate hall. The IISc convention hall is an excellent piece of design by one of the Octogenarian Alumnae being honored. Prof Dattaguru, the President of the IISc Alumnae association and also the Director of IISc himself both were at the dais. Mr. KR Srinivasan an NAL Scientist and currently an entrepreneur was introducing the distinguished guest. I was in a different world all together listening to the intellectuals narrating their experiences with the Octogenarian Alumnae being honored. Later The Octogenarian himself got up and addressed the gathering.

I can not but narrate the story told by Prof BS Ramakrishna Octogenarian Alumnae. He and Prof Satish Dhavan were at Cubbon Park where they saw Sir CV Raman searching something on the road below a florescent lamp. The Duo went and offered their help to the Nobel laureate, Sir CV Raman, who readily accepted. He asked them to collect the wings of light fly. They collected the same and gave them to Sir CV Raman. He started staring at the florescent lamp, holding the wings to his eyes and asked them to do the same. They were amazed at the spectacle created by the light passing through the insect wing. Now Sir CV asked prof Dhavan whether he had designed any of the finest aircrafts having similar wings.

I could not but believe how lucky I was to day. I got the inspiration to take up the threads of my previous post of July 18 2008 on Traffic Optimization. Hope to make my next post, continuing the same thread of Traffic Optimization where I had left it earlier, a good one.

The "Use Priciple" in action for Bangalore Traffic Police

My good friend Mr. Nanjappa was mentioning some time back his interaction with Mr. Kumaramangalam of world space networking about the parking problem, we the residents of HAL III stage face every day. He, Mr. Kumaramangalam wanted to give a representation to the Police Commissioner (His Friend) Jointly with some residents of our association. The commissioner cannot listen to one individual’s problem, even if it is his friend. Fair enough I thought.
I went to Mr. Kumaramangalam’s Office. I could talk to him very briefly from the road, as he was reluctant to invite me in to his office, as he was very busy, that day. It was not possible to meet him for the whole week too. When I mentioned about Mr. Nanjappa having discussion about the parking problem with him, he was kind enough to let me know that he wanted to give a joint petition to his friend.
Mr. Madhava Rao, who is also a resident of HAL III stage, had a similar problem. Many Taxis were being regularly parked in his road causing nuisance. He could convince the Taxi drivers about his stand on the issue viz “Road side parking in a residential area is only for visitors to the concerned resident’s visitors only per se.” The people of Bangalore including taxi drivers are very reasonable. So is every body else, in any country for that matter. It is only how the citizens put across their point, matters. So now we see that all the taxis have shifted to other roads. Some time to our roads too causing the same anguish Mr. Madhava Rao had.
Now putting the Police Commissioner’s hat let us think
1. A visitor to any person has to park as near by as possible to that person’s residence he is visiting. Be it be on the same road or otherwise.
2. It will be for a reasonably small time, depending on his visit.
3. The Taxis too have to park when they are on duty in that road or when they are not engaged.
4. When Taxis are not engaged the time they park can be longer.
5. Though the Road side parking slots in residential areas are for the public visitors, the Owners Visitors should get the preference.
6. The Ownership of the parking slots rests with the corporation/Government
7. So I (the Police Commissioner) have jurisdiction to regulate the same.
8. But I (the Police Commissioner) am having many other pressing problems.
9. Let the problem get solved by it self.
10. I wish there is some solution. But I don’t have time to find the best.
Now putting a resourceful common man’s hat let us think
1. I want preference to my visitor’s vehicles to park in front of my house.
2. I do not mind others using it at other times.
3. How do I insure my visitor finds the slot empty when he arrives?
4. I can create a parking slot and lock it up.
5. Do I ask the commissioner’s for permission?
6. Is it legal? Can I do it any way?
7. Hay I heard about the “Use Principle” of taxing people!
8. I will join hands with the Commissioner BBMP and we both end up making Money!
9. We share the cost of making a parking slot and the parking fee we charge per hour 50:50. With the BBMP.
10. Problem solved.
-----Ananthram PS A Senior Citizen

Indian Institute of Science Alumni meet

To day I attended the IISc Alumni meet held at "TERI" in Domlur. This venue was the first to be chosen out side the IISc campus. IISc being in the midst of celebrating its Centenary year, this Alumni meet had a greater significance. I attended the meeting as the venue was very near to the place where we live. The organizers were very happy to note that their decision brought the expected result. IISc which undoubtedly is a premium institute of its kind in our country has upgraded its view on its Alumni Association by appointing one of its serving senior faculties to head the association. The break fast was sumptuous with Rava Idli, Masala Dosa, Upma and coffee with Badam Halva to boot. The Quality was that of MTR too.
Professor Dattaguru opened the meet and gave an update on the activities. Ram Akella, Professor and Director, Centre for Knowledge, Information Systems, and Management of Technology, University of California, Silicon Valley Centre, who happened to be visiting Bangalore was very happy to share his thoughts.
The organizers in the year of centenary celebrations had a special invitee to this meet. He was V. Ravichander former member, Bangalore Agenda Task force (BATF).
Mr. Ravichander spoke on BATF which was formed in the SM Krishna days. Those were very difficult days as such, with Veerappan. After Veerappan terrorism has gone to the next dimension keeping in pace with the Internet! SM Krishna a computer savvy Chief Minister Set up BATF. As Ravichander told every CEO takes pride in one up man ship, government too is of no exception. BATF was wound up for good in no time with the change of the government.
With the brief talk which I had with Mr. Ravichander, I got the answer to my doubt as to why it was necessary to change from Self Assessment Scheme (SAS) system of Property tax to that of Capital Value System (CVS):

1. It was BATF according to him who proposed SAS, in line with Income Tax (IT) Assessment, which we file every year. We file our income tax return as per the current IT levied by the government from time to time. There are charted accountants who help us to file our Tax returns as per law. The onus is on the IT department to maximize the revenue for the government by unearthing tax evaders by working hard and honestly. It is a crime to evade taxes. This system of putting the onus on the tax payer to first file the returns as per the requirements avoids the IT department’s indulgence in colluding with the tax payer for personal gains. How this is different for the city corporation when BATF proposed SAS which is nothing different than IT returns Scheme which Citizens are following through out the country? Why should Bangalore Corporation have accepted SAS only for 5 years? Did they require 5 years to do research over and above the self appointed expert committee BATF?
   
2. This clearly shows the fallacy of the law makers, who want the corporation to be on the bargaining side by having the opportunity to collude with the public for obvious reasons.
   
3. At that time when BATF whom the then government had appointed, proposed SAS probably they were in a fix to reject. So it appears they accepted it for 5 years as a law.
   
4. After the 5th year SAS would become illegal automatically!
   
5. The % of honest to not so honest citizens is an astonishing 40:60 ratio
   
6. It requires hard work for the corporation to raise enough money.
   
7. Citizens are not averse to the fact that Government requires more money for Development.
   
8. The use principle, comes in handy for this purpose.

Ravichander also mentioned that traffic optimization was also burning issue addressed by the BATF, apart from other issues like infrastructure. He talked about the Metro rail project and Bus route optimization etc.
After the talk was over all the Alumni were so excited that the time flue without any one noticing other than the organizers.

1. There was an excellent suggestion that bus fares should be subsidized which would provide enough incentive for people to use it instead of using their own transport. There is no point in having too many vehicles and optimize the traffic.
   
2. Develop Satellite towns on the Chennai model etc.

The rain god had to intervene when the meeting abruptly ended.