[am1m]

Originally Posted by karanddd

I truly believe that if our cities are made more walkable, it'll drastically improve our quality of life.

You can say that again!

Most people don't want to walk. I used to work at an IT park in Bangalore and because of the horrible design, only one entrance/exit road, it could take up to 20mins even by bike to enter/exit that 1-1.5km stretch in the morning and evenings. The place had good footpaths with trees for shade too, yet most people in their 20s or 30s would queue up for the shuttle bus, which would be stuck in traffic too!

Just look at all the people who just have to park bang in front of shops/restaurants and block traffic, unloading their families even though there might be enough parking space 100-200 meters away. And of course the "solution" is "valet parking" - which is basically a restaurant employee taking their car in parking it in front of someone's house in the adjoining residential area, causing blocks there!

Whenever I work from a smaller town, even those with considerably worse weather than Bangalore, I end up walking so much because it's such a pleasant experience. Open areas, hardly any traffic. And it's amazing exercise too. Here in Bangalore it's a nightmare to step out of the neighborhood! Whatever footpath is there, is taken over by vendors. There's constant honking and even bikes riding on the footpath!

As someone has already mentioned, the CBD area of Bangalore is a great example of how the Metro+better walking infra has turned things around. Went to school there in the 80s and 90s, worked there in the early 2000s and I can say that with the start of the metro in 2011, that area has been transformed. Used to be a pain to visit, now I go there every weekend thanks to the Metro and footpaths. Cubbon park when it's shut to traffic in the morning and on weekends is paradise! And yet you'll see most of the complaints (especially on this forum) are about how the wide footpaths have made the roads narrower in that area!


Increasing infra for cars (flyovers, widening roads) is a strategy with diminishing returns. Planning for public transport with walking infra is the only way forward for our cities. Glad that slowly things are inching along that way.