Complete chaos prevails at the BRT corridor between Moolchand and Ambedkar Nagar due to the Delhi Government’s failure to implement its order.
While soon after coming to power, the Aam Aadmi Party Government had announced the dismantling of the controversial corridor and an “in principle” order was issued in June to do away with it.
But even four months after the order, work is yet to begin on the ground. The divisions on the road demarcating bus lanes still exist; the bus shelters still lay in the middle of the road; the traffic still crawls and pedestrians still face a harrowing time crossing the roads.
To add to the chaos, commuters are confused over where the buses will stop for passengers to board and alight. This has resulted in complete anarchy on the 5.8 kilometre long stretch.
Despite bus stops still being in the middle of the road, many buses don’t enter bus lane and ply on the sides resulting in major confusion for passengers as to where to wait for the bus. Often they have to rush to cross the road, dodging cars and bikes and risking their lives, when the bus they are waiting for doesn’t even come to the designated stop (in the middle) and stops on the side lanes.
It must be noted that announcements have been made on multiple occasions for the scrapping of the controversial BRT project over the last nine months, but the plan is still stuck. After the “in principle” go ahead in June, a committee was set up to figure out the modalities of the project. Then a budget of Rs11 crore was approved for the same and PWD was assigned the job. The file for allocation of funds is still with Cabinet, said sources.
According to sources, the tender to assign the work of dismantling the BRT corridor is yet to be issued by the Public Works Department (PWD). Under these circumstances, it is highly unlikely that the task would be completed by the end of this year, said sources.
Meanwhile, Delhiites will have to bear with the chaos with all kinds of vehicles spilling over to the bus-lanes, and buses often moving to the normal lanes leading to a complete mess. What makes it even worse is that the vehicles that spill over to the bus lanes often encroach into the lane meant for traffic from the opposite side because there is no vertical barrier within the BRT corridor to separate the lanes.
Bowing the public pressure and because of the accidents that have occurred in that stretch over the past few years, the Delhi Government had in July announced that the BRT corridor will be completely dismantled.
Earlier, The Pioneer had run a consistent campaign highlighting the design flaws of the corridor and problems faced by commuters, including pedestrians, due to the faulty design of the BRT.
last year, Delhi Police Commissioner BS Bassi had given a report to lieutenant-Governor Najeeb Jung on the corridor, calling the BRT a highly dangerous stretch. Former Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit had also acknowledged in 2013 that the project had been a failure.
In a report in 2013, the Central Road Research Institute (CRRI) had favoured dismantling the corridor. The CRRI had found that speed of the vehicles was considerably lower on the BRT stretch than other stretches.