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Protest against Error-ridden Voters' list - 31st March

Vote Bengaluru protests against error-ridden electoral rolls in Bangalore

Date: Monday, 31st March 2008
Venue: Mahathma Gandhi Statue, M.G. Road
Time: 10.30 AM to 12.00 noo

All are welcome. Please come in large numbers.

Dear friends,

CVS - return to Inspector Raaj

When a tax computation system changes, citizens are naturally apprehensive. This is currently the case with the proposed introduction of Capital Value Scheme (CVS) for property tax in Bangalore as mandated in the Karnataka Municipal Corporations Act. This changes the widely welcomed Self Assessment Scheme (SAS) that has been in operation since 2000.

One convincing reason for us to use public transport and bicycles

Public Transport
They say a picture says a thousand words. Here is a poster that show the space occupied by same number of people using Cars, bus and cycles.
Can it get any more convincing than this?
Courtesy: Core77 blog.

TOI Unlock Bangalore Event - Learnings

Public Transport
As you all might have read in the papers, TOI had an Unlock Bangalore event at The Leela on March 28th 2008. Many say the event was merely a publicity stunt (as no other paper was allowed inside), but even so the secondary results were fruitful.

Harnessing a scarce resource

Governor Rameshwar Thakur's call for constituting a 'Water Resources Regulatory Authority', vide the report in your columns on 26th March under the caption 'PPP can be answer to water scarcity', has not come a day too soon.

Dependability of BMTC in question

Public Transport
Within the same week, there have been two instances of BMTC buses being involved in serious crashes, supposedly due to 'brake failure'. In one, the conductor died, even as many were injured, and quite seriously too, in both.

The need for BRTS

Metro RailTrafficPublic Transport

This refers to the article in TOI & the guest column by Muralidhar Rao.

The basic premise on which public transport is based is that if the road seems too narrow with high volumes of traffic, there is a case for public transport. The higher the volume of traffic on a road, the stronger is the case for public transport.

In India, the low–cost /low–quality public buses are now not preferred by the upwardly mobile strata. Rail-based systems (such as Metro /Monorail) are very expensive to build & maintain & will therefore, not have extensive reach for a long time to come. The city cannot make do with widening roads & adding elevated roads continuously. No city has ever been able to “build” its way out of the problem. A new, faster & cost efficient system is required for quality conscious groups, over & above the existing low quality bus network. BRTS fulfills these requirements & is perhaps, the only available alternative worth exploring.

The Traffic Quagmire – Using Logic & Rationality the Right Way

Metro RailTraffic

Vasanth - your post ‘Using Technology the Right Way’ made good reading.

We can come up with umpteen reasons for the chaos that traffic is, but simply put, there is just one real core issue – the city is trying to cope with traffic loads for which it’s road network certainly was never designed nor envisaged. Despite having lost the battle time & again, all efforts so far have been to satisfy the ‘Car lobbies’, even at the expense of pedestrians, bicyclists & public transport users. Planning & Construction of the Metro rail is the only exception.Plans, policies & procedures that involve a multi-dimensional approach to seek long-term & permanent solutions have never materialized, though efforts have been made.

Questions for BIAL - your turn!

Aviation

[Update: Date for BIAL trip moved to Sunday, Apr 6th. Unfortunately, only 20 can go. We will give preference to long time members and those who write/comment a lot on BIAL here].



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