A senior traffic police officer said that the stretch between Varthur Kodi and Sarjapur Road has joined the 17.1-km Outer Ring Road stretch between Silk Board junction and K.R. Puram Metro as one of the most congested roads in the city.
| Photo Credit:
ALLEN EGENUSE J.
A senior traffic police officer said that the stretch between Varthur Kodi and Sarjapur Road has joined the 17.1-km Outer Ring Road stretch between Silk Board junction and K.R. Puram Metro as one of the most congested roads in the city.
| Photo Credit:
ALLEN EGENUSE J.
A senior traffic police officer said that the stretch between Varthur Kodi and Sarjapur Road has joined the 17.1-km Outer Ring Road stretch between Silk Board junction and K.R. Puram Metro as one of the most congested roads in the city.
| Photo Credit:
ALLEN EGENUSE J.
For a commuter driving the nine-km stretch of State Highway-35 between Varthur Kodi and Sarjapur-Ambalipura Road, the journey is an exercise in navigating one hurdle after another. Open drains run alongside the road, mounds of soil occupy non-existent footpaths, thick clouds of dust induce bouts of coughing, and commuters are forced to constantly manoeuvre around potholes along this busy stretch of east Bengaluru.
While the recent incident of schoolchildren struggling in buses for hours exposed the everyday ordeal of commuters in the locality amid crumbling road infrastructure, a recent Bengaluru Traffic Police analysis of congestion has revealed that this State Highway is now among the city’s most congested stretches.
A senior traffic police officer confirmed to The Hindu that this stretch (between Varthur Kodi and Sarjapur Road) has joined the 17.1-km Outer Ring Road (ORR) stretch between Silk Board junction and K.R. Puram Metro as one of the most congested roads in the city. What’s more? On several days, the congestion on SH-35 has surpassed that on the ORR, according to the officer.
“When the congestion data is compiled, it is not just the main corridor whose traffic volume is considered. Even the connecting roads are counted to draw the final congestion length,” the officer explained. “As even the smaller roads are clogged at all points in a day and movement is slowed down, the travel time in the area has shot up multifold. This has led to large volumes on other roads,” he explained.
Explaining why it is overtaking the ORR, the officer said that the ORR stretch witnesses traffic during peak hours, while on weekends it is non-existent. Unlike the ORR, traffic is persistent on SH-35 throughout the day, which makes it notorious.
Limited infrastructure
The locality, which falls under the Mahadevapura Assembly constituency, hosts scores of apartment complexes and more than 20 top schools, making it a busy residential area that also has a mix of tech companies coming up.
Narendra Rao, resident of Gunjur village, puts it like this: “While there are skyscraping apartment complexes, with thousands of vehicles owned by those apartment dwellers, the road infrastructure is very limited. Roads that exist are extremely narrow and incapable of holding the growing vehicle numbers.”
The entire nine-km stretch, barring a few kilometres closer to Sarjapur Road, is dotted with large craters, and at some junctions, such as the Rama Temple near Gunjur Bus Stop, there are no signs of a road.
Three choke points
The nine-km stretch predominantly has three choke points: the junction at Varthur Police Station, the Gunjur-Mugulur Road junction, and the point near the Muthasandra Main Road cross near Varthur Lake. At all these junctions, there are no traffic signals, and vehicle flow is manually managed by traffic police officers and local residents throughout the day.
Prasanna Bhat, Varthur resident who works as a traffic volunteer, explained that the highway is a crucial connecting link in the eastern outskirts and that all heavy vehicles use the stretch. This, coupled with hundreds of school buses and local vehicles, makes the stretch a high-density road.
“With civic works ongoing and bad road conditions, vehicle movement is slow, which naturally creates congestion,” he said. However, what makes it worse is that the slow-moving traffic on this stretch has a ripple effect on the connecting stretches.
Clogged connecting roads
There are over eight major connecting routes to the State Highway, which converge a high volume of vehicles onto the highway. These key connecting stretches include Hosahalli Road, Balagere Main Road, Gunjur-Mugalur Road, Gunjur-Doddakannelli Road, and Gunjur-Balagere Road.
Most of these stretches are narrower, with some even spanning 20 to 25 feet when travelling into the interiors. In addition, these are the roads that bear the maximum load, as the majority of the apartment complexes are located along these stretches.
Naturally, when the State Highway chokes at key junctions, these smaller roads, bearing large volumes of vehicles, see elongated congestion, which extends beyond 1.5 km many times, especially during peak hours.
Footpaths and drains
While motorists bear the brunt of the traffic, residents are left in misery with limited to no pedestrian infrastructure along the stretch, especially near Varthur Police Station.
Rohan, a pedestrian, narrated his ordeal and said: “Crossing the road from one end to another takes five minutes, and walking along the stretch is impossible because the footpaths are either dumped with mounds of mud or the drains are not covered by slabs.”
Adding to the issues is a substantial amount of dust hovering in the air as civic works are ongoing. In many places, pedestrians have to climb up mounds of mud and then climb down to walk along the stretch.
In addition, civic negligence is substantial, with cables lying around, uncovered drains, unmoved construction material, and dumped construction debris.
However, this condition has existed for more than a year, with the Karnataka Road Development Corporation (KRDCL) delaying two civic works: a flyover at Varthur Kodi and the widening of SH-35.
While the project was taken up in 2019, there has been limited on-ground implementation. The original deadline to complete the project was 2021. However, according to GBA sources, the on-ground works are yet to gather pace.
Meanwhile, speaking to The Hindu, Lokhande Snehal Sudhakar, Additional Commissioner, East City Corporation, said: “There was a land acquisition issue, but now we are issuing TDRs to property owners. Meanwhile, there are a few land losers who are demanding cash compensation, which has to be approved and processed by the KRDCL.”