Finally waking up to the pathetic condition of city roads, a
red-faced civic administration on Thursday announced several
improvements to its road-repair system. These measures, if implemented,
will speed up the system for filling potholes.

More than 13,000 potholes have been reported since June.

The civic administration hinted that contractors were short-changing
the civic body, and warned of severe action against them.  “We have sent
samples of the cold-mix  technology used by contractors fix potholes to
the civic laboratory. If the quality of samples is found to be
inferior, severe action will be taken against contractors,” said SVR
Srinivas, additional municipal commissioner, in charge of roads.

Every 10 days, road engineers would have to submit reports on the
condition of roads in the areas under their jurisdiction, the
administration said. Srinivas also said engineers would have to ensure
all potholes are fixed, whether they are reported on the pothole
tracking system or not.

The standing committee demanded a roadmap from civic officials on short term and long term measures for better roads.

HT’s recent audit of the BMC’s pothole tracking system found  repair
work done on many potholes to be shoddy and several technical flaws in
the system delayed action on complaints.

The ruling Shiv Sena-BJP alliance shifted the blame of the condition
of city roads on the bureaucratic wing of the BMC, for taking
‘citizen-unfriendly’ decisions.