https://countercurrents.org/2022/04/metro-trains-running-empty-people-need-buses-provide-buses/
More empty seems to be the talk that Metro will reduce private vehicle use. High rise buildings dot the skyline over vast areas of the newly opened route. Right outside Dahanukarwadi station I saw two large buildings of Hiranandani group coming up. Then there are posh buidings with names like Ruparel Palacio, Symphony and Aspire to name just a few. It would be foolish to expect even a small section of these residents to take to the Metro as the rich are addicted to the motor car and in a poor country the car is especially a big status symbol. If the government had been really sincere, it would have drastically reduced car parking provisions in these areas but it is doing the opposite. In fact, it expects and wants more and more high rise buildings to come up on remaining stretches of land on the route which includes localities of the poor so visible from the overground train with stones piled on the roofs as a protection against being blown off by the wind. The whole idea is to displace the poor occupying what is considered prime space which only the rich deserve, our rules think. So there will be further swelling of motor car use, not reduction. Elementary.
The public needs to ask very serious questions to the establishment about its grand projections of big ridership and double standards. The authorities are spending thousands of crores on the Metro. If they had invested even a fraction on buses the whole state would have benefited. The government must be exposed on several counts. It is good that there are clean toilets at each Metro station including separate toilets for the physically challenged. Why on earth should these not be provided at suburban stations and in bus depots ?
By Vidyadhar Date
4/4/2022
