Moving Goalposts
Moving goalposts. That’s right. That seems to be the mantra of the government departments involved in either the IT expressway or the kathipara flyover or the pallavaram/chrompet flyover or even the mrts expansion facility. The first time I passed through the kathipara junction there was this yellow board, which outlined the project costs, the name of the construction company, the proposed method of construction, start date and date of completion. The board still exists though, but just that the date of completion seems to have shifted. On one hand, I am at least happy to see significant progress on the other it is disheartening to see the gross violation of deadlines. The more the time taken directly results in increased costs and by the time the said project is open for public use it is just not able to handle the capacity. Demand forecasting is something that is totally absent. The city is at the threshold of a major expansion and unless we wake up now and spruce up infrastructure we are in for another Bangalore in the making. Why not learn a thing or two on project management from the Delhi Metro and its team which is completing its projects ahead of schedule.
What is the new deadline for completion? Also, where has construction progressed to? When I was in Chennai, in December ’06, they were done up to SRP Tools Jn.
I agree Vinod. You have cited three examples. If you consider that the urban infrastrcuture planned for Chennai over the next five years, inclusing the two metro lines, totals an investment of Rs 18000 crores, the magnitude of the build out is evident. We just dont seem to have the project management skills or the political will. Everything seems to be on a ‘doable when able mode’, and thats not going to benefit the city. there should be some way of hloding the concerned authorities accountable.
I have been following this Chennai Blog with Keen interest and I have also been interested deeply with the projects like IT Highway and like (which can transform this city into a world class one).
I am however , quite pessimistic on the IT highway, having seen the project move at snail’s pace (since 2004). After seeing the road very recently, I personally would feel that IT Highway would be completed only by 2009.
One reason I could think of is that of Delhi and Mumbai are India’s top two cities for various reasons and. In chennai, like david mentioned, everything seems to happen in a rush, all targetted to complete within 5 years to ensure the planning party gets to declare them open. Its politics again!
I hear the sucking sound of the vortex of low expectations!!! This seems to be my favorite comment when I see people compare one Indian city to another. Lets get our benchmarks right. We should benchmark each city against the best city in the world. Do we not deserve good world class cities? If we expect crap, we will get crap. :-)