To reclaim city’s lost footpaths, citizens out on ‘walking project’

Six Groups Come Together To Conduct Pavement Audit, Prepare Manual By August     As the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development was being inaugurated in Rio de Janeirio, six citizens' groups from across the city came together to launch a 'Walking Project' for Mumbai. The project is their way of creating sustainable development for the city.      "Good pavements mean people will walk on the footpaths and not on the roads. This will reduce congestion by as much as 35%," said Rajesh Kumar of the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute.      Kumar said bad footpaths mean people have no option but to walk on roads and this slows down traffic, increasing dust and noise pollution directly affecting physical and mental well-being. "Instead of creating wider and wider roads, the civic body and the state government must focus on creating wider footpaths to ensure pedestrians walk without hindrances, accommodate hawkers, utilities and trees. We need pavements for the health and safety of citizens," he said.      While the Lady Jamshetji Road at Mahim has perfect pavements, on the Andheri-Kurla road, people prefer to walk on the road as the pavements are a nightmare. "If it can be done in one part of the city, it can certainly be done all over," said Rishi Agarwal, member of the Mumbai Environmental Social Network.      To ensure this happens, the groups have set up a website—walkingproject.org—from where residents can download a form to audit pavements' condition in their neighbourhood.      "They can take pictures of the pavement, upload both on our website and also forward them to the local ward officer and corporator," said Agarwal, adding that by August they plan to compile all the data, along with the cost of constructing a good pavement visà-vis money spent on making roads and also prepare a pavement manual for the BMC.      The group plans to hold walkshops to create awareness on benefits of good pavements and train residents to audit footpaths. "We shall list the best and worst wards in terms of pavements and all this will be presented to the mayor and the municipal commissioner at the conference,'' he said.      Sudhir Badami, member of the erstwhile road monitoring committee of the Bombay high court said 44% of people in the city walk daily.      The immediate aim is to ensure that people stop hiring vehicles for short trips to the railway station and local market. "If we shave off 1,000 km of such trips, we will certainly reduce the pollution level in the city. But for this to happen we have to provide good pavements," said Agarwal.      Vikas Gilani of the No to CO2 Foundation said if a person were to walk a kilometre every week it would reduce carbon dioxide by 250 kg, equivalent to planting a tree. SOLUTIONS TO OVERCOME ROADBLOCKS WITH PEDESTRIAN AS PRIORITY UDRI PREPARES FORT MANAGEMENT PLAN