Bharati Chaturvedi is better known as the head of Chintan, an
organization that works with waste-pickers in Delhi. But recently she
has edited a volume about the city in which she has worked for so many
years. The volume is called Finding Delhi: Loss and Renewal in the
Megacity, and based on the reviews, such as this one here by Kalpana
Sharma, we at Transparent Chennai are looking really forward to
reading it. According to Sharma, the volume shines a light on those
aspects of the city that have been most neglected by the city’s
planners, the poor and the environment. The book contains essays about
the people who work in the large informal recycling sector, about the
River Yamuna and the pollution in it, and the city’s treatment of
slums and slumdwellers.

The most interesting point made in the review by Sharma is that many
of the things that are happening today to the city’s poor are similar
to the things that happened to all Indian “natives” when the British
first declared the city their capital in India. In the same way that
the conquerors segregated themselves from the people over whom they
ruled, the rich and powerful of today’s India have managed to clear
vast swathes of South Delhi of any places where poor residents of the
city could live.

Ironic, since the whole premise of Independence was to achieve social
justice. The story of Delhi’s recent past reveals how far modern India
has moved from that vision. Chennai is not nearly as bad in its
treatment of the city’s poor, but one hopes that other Indian cities
don’t look to Delhi as a model.

- Nithya V Raman

1. An article in Hindu looks at Chennai’s increasing traffic woes and the response to this problem:

http://hindu.com/2010/12/21/stories/2010122161690200.htm

Building more and more flyovers can help ease traffic congestion only in the short run. Various studies have shown that flyovers actually increase congestion and the total number of  automobile trips made per day, in the longer run.

2. As new bicycle lanes appear in New York city, people complain about the loss of parking space and constricted traffic:

http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2010/12/21/are-new-yorks-bike-lanes-working?ref=opinion

3. Worried about the increasing air pollution, France looks at alternate ways of reducing it: boat transport, eco friendly bicycles, strengthening public transport:

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/156874.html

4. Government plans to restrict private cars in Dhaka to reduce traffic jam:

http://dhaka-rickshaw.blogspot.com/2009/09/call-for-restriction-on-growth-of.html

_______________________

Why are we the only ones looking at building flyovers at a time when the rest of the world is propagating environment and people friendly solutions? Why would we go for solutions that have actually failed in the past?

Somya Sethuraman

Reclaim our beaches is a  youth led movement to restore the sanctity of Chennai’s beaches. It started with a small group of students cleaning up the beach and creating awareness by asking the citizens to own up their garbage and not litter everywhere. On the eve of their first anniversary on Saturday, 18th December 2010, these young environmental activists were really determined to push forth their agenda by something they call ‘in the face clean up’. In the face clean up is an initiative to encourage the residents to keep the beach surroundings clean.

They received  a resounding response of a hundred and fifty plus people. As the ROB volunteers tread their path to clean they saw many people littering the beach area. The volunteers went up to them, picked the waste, gave them a look that made them feel guilty. Seeing this many people from the crowd volunteered to help out in the cleaning and the enthusiasm swept many strangers into becoming friends for a common cause.

ROB has been very active in demanding dustbins and more toilets on the beach as people are often seen polluting the place due to a lack of these basic amenities. The corporation has promised ROB to put the dustbins and toilets on the beach and have asked them for an aesthetically beautiful and financially feasible plan to maintain the beach stretch. The executive engineer and his colleague from the corporation also witnessed the clean up and were impressed. In the end, Mr. Nithyanand a famous environmental journalist, a friend and mentor of ROB, thanked everyone for their time and contribution and inspired the residents to keep the city clean and take this fruitful thought to more people.

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Transparent Chennai recently collaborated with ROB on mapping the infrastructure on Elliots beach. A map showcasing the present infrastructure i.e; ( dustbins, public toilets, vendors etc) will be up on the website soon. A report based on the mapping exercise will also be drafted in due course and sent to the Corporation.

Please write to us with suggestions and feedback, and do join ROB in their beach clean ups. We have beautiful beaches in Chennai and all of us want it clean. Don’t we? For more information: http://letsrob.org/home/

By Roshan Toshniwal, Consultant, Transparent Chennai

A friend shared this youtube video and I think it captures the essence of the problem we have in hand:

Women still don’t openly talk about their sanitation needs.

If we don’t articulate our concerns and problems, how can we expect our voices to be heard?

Let’s start talking about Sanitation

Source: http://blog.acumenfund.org/2010/12/10/sanitation-is-sexy-challenge-winners-announced/

Somya Sethuraman

Meryl Sebastian

It is being increasingly recognised that the overt emphasis on expressways and flyovers has resulted in a transport infrastructure that leans towards being motor vehicle friendly. The authorities seem to agree with this. The National Urban Transport Policy, CMDA’s Second Master Plan and Chennai’s City Development Plan recognise the need for pedestrian infrastructure and better public transport as an answer to the city’s road safety and traffic problems. But, this recognition has yet to translate itself into real action. On paper the authorities wax eloquent about centering transport policies around pedestrians, cyclists and frequent users of public transport. There are comprehensive ideas, plans and targets laid out to boost public transport.

But the Second Master Plan[1] reveals that the planned expenditure on medium-term transportation schemes is as follows-

Rs.6200 crores on 8 elevated highways,

Rs.850.12 crore on 18 flyovers,

Rs.45 crore on bridges,

Rs.1993.84 crore on link roads, and

Rs.3514.44 on improving the existing roads.

The plan estimates Rs.209 crore will be spent on pedestrian infrastructure, of which Rs.48 crore is for footpaths, the rest being spent on escalators and subways.

In May 2010, the Highways Minister told the Hindu[2] that ‘since 2006 a total of 104 ROB and rail underbridge projects to replace level-crossings, at a cost of Rs.2,246 crore, had been initiated.’

Highways Secretary G.Santhanam said that ‘tenders would be floated for 69 such projects in 2010-11 involving the Railways and in 2011-12 40 more had been planned’.

Pedestrians and cyclists form more than 40% of the average person trips. The Master Plan points out that 42% of road accidents involve pedestrians and 10% cyclists. Yet, the administration’s spotlight remains on flyovers. Currently, there are 14 Flyovers under construction in the city, of which the construction of 8 began in 2010. Several projects have been fastracked with flyovers at Nerkundram and Porur expected to be completed in 13 months instead of the standard 18. Flyovers at Maduravoyal, Koyembedu, Porur, Vadapalani, Mint and Moolakadai are slated to be completed by May 2011. [3]

One wonders at this sudden spurt of energy, one wonders at the frenzied constructions, then one thinks of the Assembly Elections of 2011. Flyovers are obvious signs of infrastructure and development activities taking place in the city. The authorities may hope that these flyovers cheerlead their achievements but whether the people are convinced is to be seen.

[1] Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority, . “The Second Master Plan for Chennai Metroplitan Area 2026.”. CMDA, September 2008. Web. 3 Dec 2010. <http://www.cmdachennai.gov.in/SMP_main.html>.

[2] “Overbridge to be ready next month-end.” The Hindu, 21 May 2010, <http://www.hindu.com/2010/05/21/stories/2010052159990300.htm>

[3] “7 FLyovers to be ready.”  The Times of India 16 Feb 2010, <http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Default/Layout/Includes/TOINEW/ArtWin.asp?From=Archive&Source=Page&Skin=TOINEW&BaseHref=TOICH%2F2010%2F02%2F16&ViewMode=HTML&GZ=T&PageLabel=2&EntityId=Ar00200&AppName=1>

Somya Sethuraman.

Jagori and Women in Cities International co-organized the Third International Conference on Women’s Safety: Building Inclusive Cities from November 22-24, 2010. The 3-day conference brought together policy makers, researchers, academicians, activists, representatives from NGOs and international organizations to talk about safety for women in cities.

Transparent Chennai was also a part of this 3 day conference which was packed with engaging presentations, speeches and workshops. We were requested to speak during the panel session on ‘Gender and Essential Services in Low-Income Communities’. Other panel members were: Prabha from Women in Cities International, Yadira from AQUACOL in Columbia, Surabhi from Jagori, Swapna a freelance consultant, an officer from the municipal corporation, and the rapporteur was Carrie Mitchell from IDRC.

Transparent Chennai’s talk was structured in three parts:

1. About Transparent Chennai and the importance of mapping the informal sector
2. Sanitation layer and field report on our findings
3. Planning processes for Sanitation in the city and implications for women’s safety

Each speaker had only 10 minutes to speak, so I had to quickly run through a lot of interesting slides which was heart wrenching. However, it was encouraging to see the panel discuss and recognize lack of access to sanitation as the biggest threat to women’s safety. Safe, secure and improved access to sanitation was recognized as one of the most basic needs in a woman’s life.

The audience and the panel were particularly fascinated by the amount of informal sector data that we have mapped so far on TC. The panel wanted to see more of  disaggregated data on our website that would help in highlighting gender specific issues. We do hope that we are able to do this in the future. What we have laid down on our website is the foundation on which more complex and disaggregated data can be built.

I was really thrilled when our team’s work got a mention during the concluding speech on day-2. The conference organizers appreciated our work and recognized Transparent Chennai as an interesting and important tool for identifying governance gaps in growing cities. What differentiated Transparent Chennai from other projects with similar goals of achieving greater governance and accountability during the panel discussion was its powerful mapping tool that allows users to overlay maps.

After attending the conference and listening to umpteen presentations by people from different parts of the globe, I realized that the issues in hand and challenges that we face are the same in all the cities. They only differ in magnitude, and solutions sought are localized in nature.

(For further event details, click here).