Ravichandar, Evangelizer, City Connectravi@feedbackconsulting.com; +919845024823

Tender SURE : Bangalore Specification Urban Road ExecutionSept 19, 2016

Long way to go

The odds of fixing our city roads are as low as a landing on the Hudson!

Tender SURE is a tale (‘shooting’ still underway ) of what’s possible

A gripping saga played out on Blr’s roads

Images

Bangalore: Images Picture perfect

Images

Bangalore: Reality Picture imperfect

A tale of 2 roads, circa 2008-09

It all began with 2 roads – City Connect* helped do the designs & interface with multiple government agencies

* In conjunction with JUSF

Walton road

Vittal Mallya road

Informal MoU with GoK: Circa Oct 2010

City Connect approaches State Government with a proposition – not just ‘gyan’ but a willingness to do its bit involving money spends

City Connect role GoK / BBMP role Build urban road manual -

focus on renewal of existing assets

Do pilot detailed project reports (DPR)

Model tender document

2 Tender SURE from their budgets

Get BBMP buy in for executing these pilot roads

Integrate activities of Govt agencies – Utilities, Public Transport, Police and BBMP

Going beyong Not invented here

The Tender SURE manual drew on experiences of those who preceded it – in India and globally

Cross pollination

Political buy in

The stakes rise with the interest shown by the Chief Minister

A gauntlet is thrown

Why low ball at 2 roads?

Lets do 50 – will (does) budget Rs. 200 crores

Point out that this might get the city 25 roads

Go ahead given

City Connect offers to do 12 roads DPR (of which 7 take off @Rs. 85 crores for about 9 kms) with BBMP as execution agency

For the balance, offer to hand hold BBMP

“We are supporting Tender SURE 100%. We will begin with 25 pilot roads in Bangalore and another 25 in other cities” – Chief Minister, Govt of Karnataka, 2011

Pecking order

We wanted to build roads around the pedestrians

For too long just lip sympathy for the vulnerable walker

Hierarchy of road users

10 | Right of way

Right of Way (RoW) critical element – designs based on street type, available width.

Motorists get uniform lanes

RoW possible for varying widths

System loves 3.5-3.75 m

Choices to be made on width allocations

Land acquisition challenges exist

The battle to get 3 – 3.3 metres accepted

3.5 metre lanes3 lanes2.25 m footpath

3 metre lanes4 lanes1-2 m footpath

Cross sections

This level of detailing at varying cross sections never done in regular contracts

X-sections vary across a stretch

Junction design

Junction designs require considerable detailing and thinking about crossovers, pedestrians

Trinity Circle junction schematic

14 | Life cycle costs

The Life cycle cost approach – relay utilities

6-7 year pay back

Inter agency coordination critical

Being green

Environment friendly design is part of the DNA

Recharge every 30 metres of SWD

You saved trees but did not plant new ones!

16 | Other design points

Other design elements of Tender SURE.

DPR, Drawings, BoQ, Cost estimates and draft tender become part of the deliverables

Other TS elements

Tender for Tender SURE: 2013

The BBMP (City Corporation) tenders were just the start of another set of challenges

No one interested

Getting bids

We had to convince credible road contractors to participate

An Empowered Committee set up with Chief Sec, Finance Sec, Commissioners

Stated reasons* for staying away

We will need to pay kick backs

City contracts messy – Corporator meddling

Our bills will not get paid in time without inducements

There is no competency in BBMP

Multiple agency coordination will not work

We don’t participate for bids below X crores

* Informal feedback given across 6 firms contacted

TS protest

There was backlash from motorists and activists

Change is never easy

Honey they shrunk my vehicle lane

Why so much importance / width to pedestrians? That’s not me

Pedestrians ok, but where are the cyclists?

Coming back to my vehicle, where is my parking space?

Traders say their business will get hit

Tender SURE is too expensive

But these roads are taking so long to build

Leaders talk is about encouraging private vehicles

It was not democratic – BBMP Corporation was not consulted

FAQs

Honey they shrunk my vehicle lane & getting State intervention over BBMP were principal objections

We responded with a FAQ to the issues raised

Restrictions

The road design had to factor in our road behavior

Bollards, but makes it wheelchair unfriendly

A day will come when these bollards can go

Execution

Project execution on our roads is akin to a open heart surgery!

The works site can be better handled

Utilities

There has been much pain in getting all utilities on board during execution

Laying it all out

15 May 2015 inspecting on going works─ Footpaths too wide. Am instructing that they be reduced and motor lanes

increased

19 June 2015 after inaugurating the completed new roads─ The footpath width and road width looks fine; must have been the barricades

that gave a different impression

─ I am announcing 50 more Tender SURE roads

CM intervention

We had a major setback with CM’s comment on footpaths and road width

Our hopes soared again post works completion!

We had a setback politically and a bounce back

Completion

The end result has been worth the good fight

Give me more

Spending

The Return on Investment to the citizens for a new paradigm on our roads is considerable

It pays to spend some to get Sum

Circa 2016

A happy problem to have – scaling up & adoption

Going forward

“We will do another 50 Tender SURE roads over the 12 started” – Chief Minister, Govt of Karnataka, 2016

Milestone reached

There are multiple learnings

Getting Government buy in

Handling criticism

Execution challenges

Staying true to design

principles

Picture perfect