Strengthening the existing divide

BANGALORE: The Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) active working has turned many heads recently. Well, their work on Enayatulla Mekhri Circle is not exactly doing the same.Mekhri Circle is one of the busiest traffic junctions in the city. Linking Bangalore North to the rest of the city, it also handles a substantial part of the airport traffic. Maybe this prompted the BBMP to plan a skywalk in the area. While the previous plan of the pelican lights does not seem to have improved people’s lives, they  are waiting for the installation of a skywalk or a subway.But the inconvenience with the same lies in the fact that the BBMP has decided to demolish everything in the area in order to reconstructing something that was not required. The dividers are down and new, concrete  walls are being built in order to replace the old. The bus stands in the area have been moved a few metres and the pavements have been broken down leaving most walkers in a lurch. While people expected more after the pelican signals were instated, nothing seems to have turned up except for long queues of traffic lining up all the way until Palace Grounds.While the building of thew dividers are being seen as precautionary signs in order to avoid accidents while crossing the road, people ask how are they suppose to cross the road if there are huge concrete blocks blocking their way. They further ask what was wrong with the plants and the normal dividers that were present on the road. When asked, Nagesh, a pedestrian, said “I usually don’t across the zebra crossing unless the cop presses the pelican light’s button. But the lights are not a permanent solution as there is a lot of traffic.”Another pedestrian, on the condition of anonymity, said, “First, they shifted the bus stand. Then, they go and break down the pavements and build concrete ones for  no reason whatsoever. WE would like to know why the change? What is reason behind it?”The BBMP engineer for major roads, Somashekhar, said, “I do not know or have any information of any kind of the work that has been going on in the area.” Chief engineer, Basavraj, was unavailable for comments.