manoj

After flyovers, subways and foot overbridges are sprouting all over the city. But who will reclaim the footpath?

It’s a robbery that has been carried out brazenly, right under the nose of officials, not in some obscure lane or bylane but along a busy traffic artery — Lala Lajpat Rai Path. The space for pedestrians has simply disappeared. Walking from the Nehru Place crossing to the Moolchand flyover in South Delhi is a revelation. What’s just a blur while driving past emerges into sharp focus — the sidewalks, wherever they exist, are offlimits for the walker. At some places, they have just been done away with. Welcome to the World City.

Vendors occupying space are the least of the evils; big offices — and residences too — all along the road, particularly on the left flank, have packed pavements with their cars. The car bazaar near LSR s on to the road; so you can hardly hold a grudge against the medicine man who has pitched his tent right on the footpath. You can’t walk anyway after the petrol pump because the entire stretch has been dug up and left like that for days.

This is better than doing away with the pavement altogether — watch when the road turns towards towards Kalkaji Temple, right at the Nehru Place crossing, or further down when it turns into East of Kailash. The debris is still scattered there.

Why tele junction boxes and plants with wire meshes around them, carrying advertisements, have to be right in the middle of the pavements is a mystery. The pavement running along the wall of a five-star hotel shows this green effort quite clearly, so you can hardly complain about a small garden having come up in front of a house. For that matter, why should a police beat box, next to a school, block the pedestrian’s path?

And why on earth has a stretch of a pavement opposite LSR been officially fenced off and turned virtually into a public urinal?

It’s the same story all around the city, with the problem much more pronounced inside colonies. The right to walk doesn’t exist any longer. To an appaling lack of civic sense has been added official indifference, even connivance at times, which is endangering thousands of lives daily.


Source: http://epaper.timesofindia.com (Delhi Edition)
Date Of Publish: 02-Apr-07

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