The Hindu 17.09.2010
Proposal to be prepared for tie-up with Germany
Special Correspondent
Ten broad areas of common interest identified
Focus will be on conservation of water resources
COIMBATORE: The Mayor of Coimbatore and the Coimbatore Corporation Commissioner will initiate the process of preparing a draft proposal for tie-ups with a German city in sharing expertise in development and education and to promote cultural exchange.
District Collector P. Umanath told presspersons here on Thursday that the proposal would be placed before the Corporation Council and also the Union and State Governments for their approval.
The Collector said this at a press briefing on the recent visit by him, Mayor R. Venkatachalam and Corporation Commissioner Anshul Mishra to the German city of Esslingen am Neckar to study the infrastructure development and activities in other areas.
The president and secretary of Esslingen Coimbatore Association also accompanied them.
It was a reciprocal visit by a team from Coimbatore, after a similar visit by one led by the Lord Mayor of the German city here in January last year.
Ten broad areas of common interest had been identified for tie-up: culture and sport; education (school exchange programme); solid waste management; traffic; healthcare; mutual exchange on activities in civil society and of service organisations; a similar exercise in industrial technology; underground sewerage; infrastructure development and environment problems.
Esslingen city looked at helping Coimbatore in the conservation of water resources, capacity building in students and carrying out improvements to Government hospitals, the Collector said.
“Esslingen views this as an exchange between two societies and not between two Government agencies of both cities,” the Collector said.
Agreement
Agreements would be signed when Esslingen's team visited the city after the proposals by the Corporation were cleared by the Council and the Governments.
On other good practices, the Mayor said plugging loss of water during distribution was being done effectively in Esslingen.
“The loss was only 7.7 per cent as against 28 per cent to 30 per cent in Coimbatore,” he said.
There was total public support to all systems in that city, right from traffic rules to judicious use of water, he said.
Mr. Mishra pointed out that all schemes in Esslingen were implemented with people's participation and this was the reason for their success.
This could be replicated in Coimbatore by increasing the awareness among the people on the significance of their involvement.
On specific basic infrastructure, Mr. Mishra said the German city had good footpaths and separate lanes for those using cycles.
The Mayor said a multi-storeyed parking lot has been constructed at the corner of every road. Besides, there was total discipline in parking. No one parked vehicles in non-designated areas.
The Collector and the Commissioner said it would be inappropriate to expect Coimbatore to change into Esslingen overnight.
Good start
The German city had a good head start in the implementation of development projects.
A number of good practices were studied and efforts would be made to apply these locally.
