Mumbai: Will concretise roads in 2.5 years, BMC tells high court

Above average rain heavy vehicle movement for infrastructure projects work on utilities by various authorities are among various reasons that have left the city roads ridden with potholes civic chief Iqbal Singh Chahal told the Bombay High Court on Friday Chahal assured the HC that the BMC would rid the city of potholemenace in twoandahalf years by concretising the remaining 1060 km of roads by thenWhen do you assure citizens good potholefree roadsrdquo asked the division bench of Chief Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice M S Karnik Responding Chahal said work was underway on huge swathes of roads and 990 km of the total 2050 km of roads under its jurisdiction have already been concretisedIn the next two and half year the BMC will concretise the remaining 1060 km of roads of which 125 km of roads would be concretised over the next three months Chahal said It will take three years if other agencies hand over their roads to the civic corporation he addedIntegrationChahal said that ldquoat least 15 agencies are in charge of at least 500 km of roads in Mumbairdquo These agencies are MMRDA MMRCL MSRDC PWD MHADA MIDC AAI BARC RCF Navy Railway SRA forest authority and private layoutsAlso read Mumbai Uddhav Thackerayrsquos BMC union skips meeting with CM Eknath ShindeSGNP flyover riddled with potholes on Western Express Highway in Borivli on August 13 PicSatej ShindeldquoThe core activities of other authorities are different such as development of ports operation and maintenance of railways construction of buildings bridges Metro etc So the maintenance of roads in their jurisdiction in Mumbai is done on low priority and potholes are not attended properlyrdquo he told the courtldquoWe need these agencies on board or the roads handed over to the BMC There are expressways that are handled by other agencies These agencies are reluctant to hand over the bridges to the BMC because of the revenue from advertising rights on these bridgesrdquo explained ChahalIf other roads and bridges are handed over to the BMC along with the advertisement rights to enable part recovery of the maintenance cost then the civic body can offer better services he told the courtThe commissionerrsquos overarching point was that since jurisdiction of different roads was scattered there were parts of Mumbai roads that do not come under BMC ldquoThe ordinary citizen of course does not know about the jurisdiction of each stretch and there is sweeping criticism of the BMCrdquo An example was the ldquofatality on the potholeridden Sanjay Gandhi National Park flyover on August 17 in which two people died That stretch was under the jurisdiction of MSRDCrdquo he saidHis broader vision was that currently there are different planning authorities operating as per ldquotheir whims and fancies What Mumbai needs is one unified planning authority like the BMC for an integrated holistic vision for the city The roads can be handed over to the BMC as a first steprdquo Chahal said he is communicating with the state government with reference to this The BMC was on Thursday handed over the maintenance of the Eastern Express Highway and the Western Express HighwayOn potholes Chahal said ldquoThe complaints have been almost 100 per cent addressed We had 16000 complaints from the Western suburbs and 10000 from the Island cityrdquo The hearing concluded with the chief justice saying ldquoThe order will be out in twothree days Meanwhile we will keep monitoring At every returnable date ask parties to file status quo reportsrdquoReasons BMC gave for potholesgtgt Rainfall is beyond average for the past four yearsgtgt Asphalt in submerged condition loses its strengthgtgt Movement of heavy machinery for infra projectgtgt Heavy density of goods carrier vehiclesgtgt Heavy vehicles beyond permissible limitgtgt Trenches from various authorities for utilities like gas sewer storm water drains etcgtgt Requests in monsoon for trenching for emergency faultsgtgt Holes dug up for huge pandals for Ganpati Navratrigtgt Improper drainage arrangement on the roadsList of roads in poor conditionIn south Mumbaigtgt Mumbadevi Marggtgt V N Naik Marggtgt T B Kadam Marggtgt Balaram Bapu Khedekar Roadgtgt T J RoadIn Western Suburbsgtgt Tagor roadgtgt Kherwadi Roadgtgt AareyMarol Maroshi roadgtgt P L Deshpande roadgtgt N S Road no 4gtgt Aarey Roadgtgt Bhoomi Park Marina Enclave roadgtgt Samata Nagar Roadgtgt Appasaheb Siddaye Marggtgt Ramkunwar Thakur margIn Eastern Suburbsgtgt M N Road from LBSKale roadgtgt D P road no 9 at Powai police stationgtgt Shivaji Nagar road 15gtgt Sonapur lanegtgt Dargah Road from LBS to Tansa pipelinegtgt Bhandup Village road125 kmRoads BMC says will concretise in next 3 months1060 kmRoads under BMC that are yet to be concretised