Urban News

The Hindu 07.01.2010

Proposals for improving road safety submitted

Staff Reporter

— Photo: M. Karunakaran

Mayor M.Subramanian inspecting a modified helmet designed by students of Anna University at ‘Chen Safe’ in Chennai on Tuesday. CMDA Member Secretary Vikram Kapur and College of Engineering, Guindy, Dean M.Sekar are in the picture.

CHENNAI: Pointing out that the explosive growth in the number of vehicles has made it extremely difficult for Chennai Corporation to keep pace by providing adequate infrastructure, Mayor M. Subramanian said that construction work on eight flyovers at various locations in the city is currently on.

“The flyover at Perambur junction will be opened for traffic by next month. Various other facilities like the provision of a lift at the Road Over-Bridge (ROB) in Nungambakkam will be inaugurated shortly,” he said.

He was speaking on Tuesday at the valedictory session of a two-day seminar on road user safety ‘Chen Safe’ jointly organised here by the College of Engineering, Guindy, and its Alumni Association.

Admitting that there is a lack of adequate infrastructure, Mr.Subramanian added that existing facilities, including ROBs, were not being utilised. “Infrastructure facilities along with proper public participation only can provide lasting solutions. Each citizen must love the city and work for its improvement instead of just leaving it to government authorities.”

As a result of the deliberations which took place at the seminar, 12 proposals for improving safety and traffic management in the city were submitted to the Mayor.

Some of these proposals were to revive traffic engineering and management cells in Chennai Corporation and in Highways Department to look into inadequate geometry of roads, giving pedestrians priority at least in areas where their movements are high, creating a traffic management school in Anna University to train in-service personnel and to relook at the methods used to issue driving licence. Stressing that focus must be on moving people, not vehicles, Vikram Kapur, Member-Secretary, Chennai Metropolitan Development Corporation (CMDA), said “Huge investments have been repeatedly made to cater to the needs of private motorised vehicles. We must not lose sight of the fact that 30 per cent of trips everyday across the city is by non-motorised means, which includes pedestrians and cyclists.”

While infrastructure services such as flyovers and road widening schemes must go ahead, he said, more attention has to be given to measures that make more people use public transport. “Limit the amount of road space available for private vehicles,” he said. Parking fee should be increased and a tax levied on vehicles entering busy commercial districts, he added. He said that authorities must not lose sight of pressing concerns by trying to become a city of grandeur with flyovers, Metro rails and expressways.

The Hindu 07.01.2010

Scheme to generate power from garbage in Tirupur

R. Vimal Kumar

Tirupur: Effective disposal of the garbage generated in the city is a key function in which the Tirupur Corporation administration has failed miserably in all these years, but now the situation seems to be changing for the better.

A Rs. 1,423.4 crore dual purpose plant is all set to come up on a public-private partnership (PPP) mode in the city that enables power generation from garbage as well as to treat effluent water, which in turn would help the Corporation and pollution control officials heave a sigh of relief.

Technology

The technology of the project had been developed by the US-based companies M-Limited and Zero Inc in technical collaboration with Texas A &M University.

Of the total capital expenditure, 90 percent would be borne by the International Finance Corporation (IFC) under the World Bank while the remaining portion need to be raised by the Corporation and other stakeholders involved in city development.

Implementation

Mayor K. Selvaraj told The Hindu that the administration had ‘in-principle accepted the concept’ and further steps would be taken for its speedy implementation after consulting the State Government and officials concerned.

Mr. Selvaraj told this after holding few rounds of interactive technical sessions with the experts from Texas A&M University on Tuesday evening and Wednesday.

Charles Allan Jones and R. Srinivasan, both Texas A &M University professors, told The Hindu that that power generated from garbage would be generated on the principle of ‘gasification-oxidation’ using recovery steam generator and stream turbine generator.

Dr. Srinivasan said that the proposed plant would have capacity to generate 30 MW power from every 1,000 tonnes of garbage.

“The power generation cost has been computed at Rs 2,760 per MW,” he added.

Distilled water

The plant would be able to produce two crore litres of distilled water a day from as many litres of effluent water.

A ‘special purpose vehicle’ would be created to operate the plant.

Revenue

The project, once commissioned, would be able to generate revenue of Rs. 441.17 crore from the sale of distilled water, power and other by-products like nitrogen, carbon-di-oxide, argon and ash.