Rants on Bangalore's traffic situation

[srishiva]

Concrete roads last realllllly long. There is a realization in the govt to go for concrete roads as much as possible. The Marine drive in Bombay was supposed have been done in 1936 or 1939 and still not resurfaced (according to Mr Gadkari).

Even with water logging on the road, they face no deterioration. With trees, the roads dont dry up quickly in Bengaluru which happens frequently for almost 9 months and traffic just creates havoc on tar roads. (also with the kind of draining thats not good)

[poloman]

Originally Posted by naveenroy

Yes, that is one of the questions I have raised. Not just the cost, I have read that concrete roads need to have a proper drainage system - for water run-off and moreover, they are also not great for the environment - not allowing rain water to seep into the ground....

I have another point too - once the lanes are completed - is there a regular garbage collection done there? Cause the vendors just keep dumping their old wares on the road.

We should not become eternal pessimists and keep on criticizing every move of the govt. KA govt is undertaking this throughout the state. I visited Davangere recently and has good lengths of concrete surfaced roads which was not the case 2 years ago.
Concreting of roads is an excellent step in a city like Bangalore. Concrete road if done properly has a service life of 20-40 years compared to 10 years for Asphalt. Also concrete roads need less patchworks which is the root of corruption in cities like Bangalore.It has better resistance to water seepage as well.
Concrete roads may lead to tyre wear but not at city speeds. The only drawback of concrete road is the higher laying cost and higher repair costs, since you need to replace the entire slab even for small potholes.

[audioholic]

Originally Posted by srishiva

Concrete roads last realllllly long. There is a realization in the govt to go for concrete roads as much as possible. The Marine drive in Bombay was supposed have been done in 1936 or 1939 and still not resurfaced (according to Mr Gadkari).

Yes. Especially when I saw the kind of thickness of the concrete being poured into the Madiwala market road, I felt it can withstand a nuclear bomb. Frankly, I think it is being overdone. That much isnt necessary. They just want to give a huge bill to the government.

Now once the right lane is done, they will get to the left which will be a bigger problem. I just hope they will just give a good layer of asphalt to the left lane within a weekend. Else the right lane is impossible for rush hour traffic with the market. Another month or two will be horrible if this happens.

[srishiva]

Originally Posted by poloman

We should not become eternal pessimists and keep on criticizing every move of the govt. KA govt is undertaking this throughout the state. I visited Davangere recently and has good lengths of concrete surfaced roads which was not the case 2 years ago.
Concreting of roads is an excellent step in a city like Bangalore. Concrete road if done properly has a service life of 20-40 years compared to 10 years for Asphalt. Also concrete roads need less patchworks which is the root of corruption in cities like Bangalore.It has better resistance to water seepage as well.
Concrete roads may lead to tyre wear but not at city speeds. The only drawback of concrete road is the higher laying cost and higher repair costs, since you need to replace the entire slab even for small potholes.

Exactly, 10 years life is if done properly
In Davanagere, Old city roads were done up in concrete some time ago and only one person controls everything and its easier to decide. Here, there are countless and I fear there will be lot of people who will not be happy if roads last for 50 years.

[naveenroy]

Originally Posted by poloman

We should not become eternal pessimists and keep on criticizing every move of the govt. KA govt is undertaking this throughout the state. I visited Davangere recently and has good lengths of concrete surfaced roads which was not the case 2 years ago.
Concreting of roads is an excellent step in a city like Bangalore. Concrete road if done properly has a service life of 20-40 years compared to 10 years for Asphalt. Also concrete roads need less patchworks which is the root of corruption in cities like Bangalore.It has better resistance to water seepage as well.
Concrete roads may lead to tyre wear but not at city speeds. The only drawback of concrete road is the higher laying cost and higher repair costs, since you need to replace the entire slab even for small potholes.

Not to criticize or be a pessimist. Main points - when you know that you are going to throw a huge amount of traffic on the Madiwala Market road - why wasn't it asphalted BEFORE the traffic was thrown on both the lanes?

Also, there is no need to spend so much money on concreting the road! A GOOD layer of asphalt is good enough. We do have to remember that it is money that we give in taxes that is being misused. My 2 rupees

[bejoy]

Originally Posted by audioholic

Yes. Especially when I saw the kind of thickness of the concrete being poured into the Madiwala market road, I felt it can withstand a nuclear bomb. Frankly, I think it is being overdone. That much isnt necessary. They just want to give a huge bill to the government.

Actually it may be worth going with the extra thickness. Considering the overloaded trucks that cause damage to every other roads, an effective repair/filling may not be possible in concrete roads, if sunken. Also BBMP/telcos can forget about drilling them.

[audioholic]

Originally Posted by bejoy

Actually it may be worth going with the extra thickness. Considering the overloaded trucks that cause damage to every other roads, an effective repair/filling may not be possible in concrete roads, if sunken. Also BBMP/telcos can forget about drilling them.

Hey come on, the overall rise in thickness is easily two feet. At least one feet of concrete has been poured. Now i am nowhere a civil engineer, but I just felt it was too thick.

And yes digging them will require dynamites

Surprisingly I reached home in a little more than an hour today though I left a little later than my usual departure time. Ecospace was not that jammed and the famed madivala market road had free flowing traffic almost till the end. It's been a nice start to the year in terms of commute. As December came to end, it would nearly take me 2hrs in the evening.

[ambivalent_98]

Originally Posted by audioholic

And yes digging them will require dynamites

This is good. So when the so many authorities who dig roads will end up blasting it everytime they dig to lay pipes..

Usually before laying concrete roads the service ducts are planned (in places where there is good planning of infrastructure). But then again we are in Bangalore. Bad planning hand in hand with no political will is a brew of disaster.

[vinjosep]

Originally Posted by audioholic

Hey come on, the overall rise in thickness is easily two feet. At least one feet of concrete has been poured. Now i am nowhere a civil engineer, but I just felt it was too thick.

Frankly I felt the thickness was not good enough to sustain for long, especially considering the number of heavy duty overloaded trucks that are to ply through those roads.

But then my proficiency in civil engineering is near zero

[srishiva]

Continuing about the concrete roads, there will be a tendering process and the requirements would have been specified. How can someone put more concrete than deemed necessary and charge more?
Even the Bengaluru-Mysuru 6 lane highway will be concrete. Its the new in thing

[JD1]

Few pages back someone had posted regarding typo on a BTP hoarding. Here's one more (source: Twitter) - Drinking license instead of Driving license!!

[suresh_gs]

Originally Posted by vinjosep

Frankly I felt the thickness was not good enough to sustain for long, especially considering the number of heavy duty overloaded trucks that are to ply through those roads.

But then my proficiency in civil engineering is near zero

That being the case all the NH roads must be made of concrete considering the volume of trucks that ply on these roads. Concrete is not the solution at all. Infact the roads on the NH last much longer due to the way they are made unlike the procedures followed in city roads.
Also the lorries that ply on the NH roads are easily overloaded to the core. If the procedure followed in making a NH road is followed by BBMP for the city roads, the results will be entirely different.
Unfortunately that is not the case.

[audioholic]

Today morning there was a banged up i10 placed in front of HSR layout police station. Was this a prop or some safety week related activity going on or a real accident? Irrespective of the motive behind it, it had slowed down traffic before the Sarjapur road signal because people were analysing the scene

[srishiva]

Originally Posted by suresh_gs

That being the case all the NH roads must be made of concrete considering the volume of trucks that ply on these roads. Concrete is not the solution at all. Infact the roads on the NH last much longer due to the way they are made unlike the procedures followed in city roads.
Also the lorries that ply on the NH roads are easily overloaded to the core. If the procedure followed in making a NH road is followed by BBMP for the city roads, the results will be entirely different.
Unfortunately that is not the case.

Not to keep this discussion going on and on, NH raods are re-tarred frequently and they do become rough after a year or so. City roads see way too much traffic than NH roads also. I have seen articles even in U.S where they espouse the longevity of concrete roads.

I think in U.S they use different binding materials even for tar asphalt roads which might not be done here.

[dark.knight]

Too many vendors in signals these days - selling the vacuum sun shade for car windows, "Ray-Ban" Aviators (even authentic Aviators have become a joke due to this rampant copying), air filled teddy's etc. However the one I dread the most is the mobile phone holder, multiple times the guy fixes the useless contraption to my windshield and shakes it to prove how tough it is to remove and then he keeps it there to convince me to buy it. Yesterday however I got out and sternly told him to remove it and be on his way before there is trouble. I cant think of things to refer to the phone for when I'm idle much less when I'm driving. These vendors while they deserve to have a livelihood, they must not resort to such forceful & irritating means to push sales. Tis about time that signal marketing be deemed illegal and dangerous.

@audioholic - don't underestimate BWSSB/BBMP, they are armed to the teeth with handheld jackhammers, pneumatic drills fixed into bulldozers & of course a taste for destruction. Concrete is not stopping them if they need to do work under it, period. The way I see it, because all these sub-divisions of local government are an ugly melange of commissioners, private contractors, 3rd party vendors etc 99% of whose bloated income depends on repeated works of repair & destruction in no particular order, nothing is going to be permanent for too long.