7 months ago
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The projected 16.7 km Tunnel Road Project betwixt Hebbal and Silk Board is present drafting disapproval for its imaginable to origin irreversible harm to Bengaluru’s largest lung space, Lalbagh Botanical Garden.
Apart from taking distant astir six acres of Lalbagh land, the task has precocious imaginable to harm the full ecosystem, since the likelihood of irreversible and unacceptable harm is high, activists, including Rajkumar Dugar from Citizens for Citizens (C4C) and others from Bangalore Environment Trust (BET), who made a study connected Bengaluru’s Tunnel Road Project and Lalbagh, said.
Pointing to the elaborate task study (DPR), they said that the task volition walk beneath Lalbagh for 700 m with 2 50-foot-wide tunnels moving 50 to 100 ft. beneath ground, on with 2 agelong ramps and a monolithic ventilation shaft. Around 23,800 sq. meters oregon astir six acres of Lalbagh onshore on the 1.1 km Siddapura Road agelong betwixt Ashoka Pillar and Marigowda Junction volition beryllium acquired. A 1.4 km introduction ramp volition commencement astir 50 m from the Ashoka Pillar, portion a 1.1 km exit ramp volition look adjacent Marigowda Junction. These volition facilitate conveyance question chiefly from Shantinagar, Wilson Garden, Dairy Circle, and Jayanagar towards Hebbal, but not successful the other direction. Activists pass the task volition choke the country with gridlocks, aerial and sound pollution, and a big of semipermanent biology hazards.
“Among the gravest concerns is the destiny of the 3-billion-year-old Lalbagh Rock, 1 of the oldest exposed rocks connected Earth, declared a National Geological Monument by the Geological Survey of India (GSI) successful 1975. The 16th-century Kempegowda watchtower lasting atop it marks Bengaluru’s aboriginal boundary,” Mr. Dugar said, pointing retired that the task proposes to bore 2 15 m tunnels and 2 10 m ramps done this past enactment utilizing almighty passageway boring machines, which could fracture the stone and destabilise the terrain.
Lalbagh Lake, dispersed implicit 40 acres, serves arsenic a captious rainwater catchment and biodiversity hotspot, location to fish, amphibians, reptiles, and migratory birds. The passageway introduction ramp from Ashoka Pillar passes little than 100 ft. from its edge, Mr. Dugar mentioned, adding that tunnelling could disrupt underground h2o channels feeding the lake, starring to flooding, drying, oregon contamination, threatening its aquatic beingness and delicate microclimate.
Activists further enactment that beneath the surface, tunnelling could severely change aquifers that prolong adjacent wells, borewells, and interconnected lakes, and that continuous h2o seepage into tunnels could drain fractured-rock aquifers, portion operation chemicals mightiness contaminate groundwater. Blocking percolation paths, they add, could deplete recharge zones and destabilize the soil.
“Lalbagh’s estimated 3,000 works species, including galore uncommon and practice trees, look adjacent peril. Trees wrong the six acres earmarked for acquisition volition person to beryllium removed, though the DPR reportedly remains soundless connected the number. Roots damaged by excavation, vibration, and dense machinery whitethorn weaken adjacent trees, starring to semipermanent mortality. The nonaccomplishment of canopy and greenish screen wrong a designated botanical plot is the worst benignant of developmental irony,” activists said.
