Bangalore booms as roads go bust

The problem continues to be that the roads leading to these vast campuses were never intended for the huge number of people working on them, and the infrastructure continues to creak. We reported six months ago that were plans to build a metro in Bangalore. Since then, we've seen no sign of digging but there are plenty of boards around with the legend Bangalore Metro, but digging on one section us supposed to start on April 15th.

Meanwhile the poor folk who have to trek to the call centres and the rest continue to face horrendous delays in the traffic while now there's also plans for a monorail in Bangalore, according to the Deccan Herald.

The paper said that the Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation has opened tenders for consultation on the work, with the entire 51 kilometre network being built by 2011. That might beat Bangalore's plans for a metro which is also supposed to be completed by 2011. The monorail will have four corridors and unlike the Vegas monorail won't connect the Bangalore casino network, because there isn't one. In fact, the local authorities want to ban horse racing at the racetrack here in town, while even the lottery is being considered with some disdain.

Another section of the Deccan Herald gives some statistics for Bangalore which are truly terrifying, with something like 24 people a week being killed on the roads here. The number of injuries isn't known, but there are plenty of people limping around on crutches and some even attempting to cross the roads on them.

Roads are for cars, light trucks, auto rickshaws, motorbikes and scooters. The traffic lights have countdowns, but not for pedestrians but for drivers, and you can hear the boy racers revving up as they watch the seconds tick away.

Four more years of this without a rapid transport system and road rage is likely to become the dish of the day.