Safety is not really a way of life here

BANGALORE: Imagine Basaveshwara Circle; four lanes bustling with traffic at all hours.Vehicles moving at breakneck speed in order to just make it in time for the green signal.Added to that, the tiny tots trying to make their way through at school hours.But officials seem to be callously disregarding the peril people are put through each and everyday.The pedestrian underpasses at the circle seems to have lost the whole purpose of having been built in the first place.Constructed in 2008, due to the severe traffic that the area was seeing and the fact that the road is a passageway to the airport, as the whole purpose of why they were instated in the first place seems lost.If anything the traffic has increased multifold in the locality in the past four years.Another cause of concern is the expenditure that has gone into the building of the underpasses as this policy of ‘what’s locked, stays locked’ seems to be the latest mantra adopted by the authorities concerned.Pedestrians say that the underpass has been locked from the past two to three months.Vanaja, an elderly citizen, said, “The whole point of the underpass was to ensure that everyone crosses the road without injuring oneself.But if it stays closed with a lock around it, pedestrian accidents are bound to increase.The authorities need to take caution.” The underpass links one side of the Basaveshvara Road to the other.The junction has not been provided with audible alarms for pedestrian crossing either.So if a pedestrian has to cross the road, one has to walk all the way until the signal, wait for it to turn red and then cross over.The same has left many people, mainly the elderly huffing and puffing their way through the area.While the introduction of the skywalk near a reputed school in Palace Road has definitely reduced the traffic woes, kids do not know how they are suppose to traverse their way through this road.Anil, a pedestrian on the road, remarked, “If the BBMP had a problem with the underpass, they must have taken action and sorted it out within a few days.Keeping it locked is not the solution.Several people need to use the signal junction to cross the road everyday.It is not fair to us.” The Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) chief engineer for the area, Suresh, said, “The reason it has been closed is due to seepage.Ground water has been found entering the underpass.We are still discussing the project and how a solution can be found for the same.” He further added that he couldn’t even give an approximate date for the opening of the underpass.Until the ‘blessed’ day when the BBMP decide to open the underpass again, all can do is hope that the day is not far away and the roads are safe again.