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Richmond Circle Flyover - another step
towards a hi-tech Bangalore city
The 
Chief Minister's dream of converting Bangalore into
Singapore is being slowly but surely realized by converting
the garden City into the Concrete City with the construction
of the flyovers. Richmond Circle Flyover is another
in the long list of Flyovers planned along with flyovers
like Sirsi Circle Flyover, Richmond Circle Flyover
and Hudson Circle Flyover! Mekhri Circle
underpass, road under bridges and over bridges are being
planned or are already nearing completion. These efforts
will go a long way in reducing commuting time and pollution.
This project comes under the Bangalore Mega City
Project, making Bangalore a High Flying City. It
was under the assistance of KUIDFC (Karnataka
Urban Infrastructure Development Project that was set
up in 1993 by the Government) that both the Sirsi Circle
Flyover and Richmond Circle Flyover was constructed.
The 1.32-km, four-lane, one-way, flyover begins from
the junction of Mission and K H Road and ends  at
the junction of Richmond and Residency Road. The Richmond
circle Flyover, an important junction costing Rs.18
Crore will ease traffic flow in the centre of Bangalore.
The flyover will provide a carriageway of six metres
on Mission Road, Residency Road and Richmond Road, 7.5
metres on K H Road and 14 metres on Lalbagh Road. The
structure is built to take a load of up to 300 metric
tonnes and the weight is borne by 49 piers and 185 girders.
It has taken 15,000 cubic meters of cement concrete,
2,500 metric tons of steel, 500 metric tons of structural
steel and about 200 metric tons of pre-stress wire strands.
The construction of the roads beneath the flyover was
done by Larsen & Tourbo.
The  work,
planned to be completed by the III quarter of 2001, was
spread over the tenure of four commissioners, and is ready
well within the stipulated time frame. The East-West
Construction Group constructed it on a turnkey basis
and finished it within BMP's allotted time. In comparison
to the Sirsi Circle Flyover, this project had many
reasons for the delay of work, like trouble with the police,
the lorries carrying away the debris were not allowed
to do so on several occasions and possession of the site
to build the flyover was not given to them for close to
six months. Because of the constant movement of traffic,
the work was carried out only at  night,
which held up the pace of work. The lack of proper accommodation
led the construction group to house the workers in various
localities of the city. Some of East Coast Construction's
nightmares were the water pipes, crisscrossing cables
and wires underground, of which neither the KPTCL nor
anyone else had a clear picture. These problems held up
the construction work for a considerable amount of time.
Around 300 labours have toiled for close to 18 months
with no holidays except ten days of rest during the Rajkumar
kidnap drama, and helped in completing this Mega Project.
Kudos to them for coping with all the inherent problems
and also for doing a wonderful job in the end.
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12:21:52 AM 
