Parisar’s analysis of PMC’s budget for 2010-11 shows that it is a mixed bag with a few good ideas mixed with some apparently good ideas which may not be so, and some others that are downright bad. The capital expenditure budgeted for transport projects is huge – Rs. 909 crores – which is just under half of all the budgeted capital expenditure (Rs. 1976 cr) and a good 28% of the entire PMC budget (Rs. 3246 cr).

Parisar is glad to publish the results of a recently conducted study on the one-way scheme implemented by PMC (and the Pune traffic police) on Jangli Maharaj (JM) and Fergusson College (FC) roads. The report critically analyzes the decision making process behind the scheme and the impacts of the scheme. It is further supported by interviews of different kinds of road users (such as pedestrians, cyclists, bus users and motorists) and other stakeholders such as local residents and commercial establishment owners.

Walking on the roads in any Indian city is an unpleasant business. Dodging traffic, sidestepping puddles of water, ducking under sign boards, navigating around heaps of construction material always conveniently dumped on footpaths - a pedestrian is faced with an unending series of obstacles. Most of these are because of the sheer apathy towards a walker by the public authorities, somehow you're just not important enough to be provided a nice walkable pathway.

The “walkmobile” was invented by Hermann Knoflacher, Professor at the Institute of Transportation at Vienna University of Technology. It is a simple frame made of wood and has the size of a car. A belt makes it easy to walk around with this frame. The idea of the “walkmobile” is to show how much space a car needs and how much city space we are willing to cut from public space and give it away to the group of car drivers. This results in streets where the whole width is reserved for cars and motorbikes, leaving almost no space to pedestrians - as seen on many streets in Pune. If all the pedestrians would walk around with a “walkmobile” occupying the same space as a car, our footpaths will be very fast as congested as streets are today.