Sunday, July 03, 2011

About Delhi Airport, Metro Rail and others


Elephant statues at Delhi Airport
 In my recent trip to Delhi I was spellbound by the new look of the Delhi's Indira Gandhi airport, post the Commonwealth games (debacle?). Although the games did see India win a lot of medals, but eventually the amount of badmouthing that had followed the games has made us wonder - do we really have to host such games. But looking at the Delhi airport, I was amazed by the spanking new Lounges, the long corridors of Walkalators, and beautifully decorated interiors.
To top it off, the Delhi Metro Express line is a class apart, though a bit steep for the Indian pocket. Thankfully, the spittoons are in place, and all the Paan and Gutka enthusiasts are forced to spit before entering the platform. No wonder, the ubiquitous paan stains criss crossing the entire length of the platform walls was missing!


Car Lottery
Recently in Chennai too, the government has not only started work on Metro-Rail, but even started feasibility study on Mono-Rail, which in simple terms is nothing but a train on rails. We certainly have to start thinking about augmenting our public transport in every city, as the number of private vehicles on Indian roads are increasing at an alarming rate, and so is the frequency of accidents. In India we cannot think of doing a Car-Lottery like China, where one has to participate in a lottery to get a licence plate for his car. If he is not lucky enough then he can certainly own a car, but not drive it on the roads.