Several stretches of dedicated bicycle tracks in New Town are blocked by parked vehicles, construction materials and stalls selling anything from fruits to cellphone paraphernalia. Hidco, which builds infrastructure across the township, has set up around 17km of graded bicycle tracks in New Town.
In some areas there is a lane set aside for cyclists on pavements while in others tracks have been demarcated on roads with green paint and plastic barriers.
The barriers made of reinforced plastic are bolted to the road surface and have been fixed at regular intervals. However, they do little to prevent vendors from setting up stalls on the tracks thereby blocking them off completely.
Metro drove through all three action areas of the township and saw several stretches of the tracks have been encroached upon by vendors selling fruits and vegetables who had parked their vans and carts on the tracks, completely blocking them behind Nazrul Tirtha.
To add to the problems some of the vendors had unloaded their stock on the road with crates and boxes lying on not just the bicycle tracks but also the main carriageway of the road.
Cars were parked in several sections of the cycle tracks on the road leading from Pride Hotel behind the New Town bus stand to Hidco Bhavan. Vendors parked their carts on several stretches of the tracks opposite Tata Medical Center in New Town’s Action Area I.
Sundeep Agarwal, who regularly pedals for at least two hours in New Town, said the obstacles on the tracks were not only proving to be quite risky for the cyclists but were a risk for the pedestrians as well as motorists.
“We try to cycle through the tracks as they are safer. However, the entire purpose is defeated since we have to continuously get off the tracks because of stalls, parked cars or dumped construction materials,” Agarwal said.
According to him, they have to often brake at the last minute or take sharp turns to get out of the tracks because of the obstructions and get in the way of vehicles that zip past at great speed.
Mudit Chaudhary, a resident of BC Block in New Town’s Action Area I, said that although New town was the only part of the city that had graded bicycle tracks, they were being increasingly encroached upon and urged the authorities to keep the lanes free of obstacles.
“We are happy to live in a place where there are designated bicycle tracks. The rate at which encroachment is rising in this planned area we will hardly have any roads left if it goes unchecked,” said Chaudhary.
Debashis Sen, the chairman and managing director of Hidco, said that they would undertake a drive to free the tracks of obstacles. According to Sen, regular awareness drives are carried out and building contractors have been told several times at meetings not to dump construction materials on the roads, especially on the newly made tracks.
Stall owners and vendors too have been told not to keep their wares or set up stalls blocking pavements and the tracks. “We will hold a coordination meet with the police and figure out ways to clear up the tracks as well as pavements,” Sen said.