Metro Buss-Islamabad and Rawalpindi-Conclusion

In my previous write-up I had tried to lay stress on Strategic Planning, Human Capital Development, and Industrial competiveness for a rapid mass transportation system. In this section I will try to educate the readers on other issues that need attention with such projects.

The logic given for this transport system using a single line is to ferry commuters who mainly live in Rawalpindi and work in Islamabad. I will try to analyse this logic and see if its really counted when planning and executing this project. Were all aspects and alternatives thoroughly researched and if they were does any proof of that exist.  

Commuter Traffic routes Rawalpindi-Islamabad

To start with there are two major arteries the Kashmir Highway and the Islamabad express way. Two major entry points from Rawalpindi to Islamabad are through the ‘Motorway Chowk’ linking daily commuters from Wah, Taxilla, Fatehjang, Tarnol etc to the capital city via Kashmir highway. Another entry point for people residing on the outskirts of Rawalpindi is through the Golra Road linking it to Kashmir Highway.  There are others as well but I am just talking about the routes that are frequented by commuters at least in my student days. The other major commuter concentrations are along the other major artery Islamabad expressway are the IJP road at Pir Wadahi Mor on GT road that ends at Faizabad. This is one of the most crowded commuter prone routes as most very low income families of Rawalpindi reside by the right side of this road. Also the main gathering point for intercity low income travellers from northern and central Punjab and the rest of Pakistan end at Pir Wadahi Bus stop very close by. The other route adjacent to it is the Murree Road axis Starting from Saddar and ending at Faizabad. This road is the commercial hub of Rawalpindi & by far the most crowded of the roads connecting Rawalpindi to Islamabad at Islamabad expressway. This is the link road on which RWP-ISL Metro is being built. The last major link is the Airport road that starts from GT road and ends at Coral Chowk at Islamabad expressway. In total we have about 5 major routes 2 links on Kashmir highway and three on Islamabad expressway. 

Possible traffic scenarios at the Rawalpindi Section:

If a single fast link for commuters is established at one of the busiest intersections like the Murree road neglecting other routes for travel most commuter traffic from Rawalpindi’s other links will ultimately converge at flashman’s hotel interchange i.e starting point, on Murree road each stop will be a starting point from many localities inside Rawalpindi most commuter traffic from other links close to Islamabad expressway at Faizabad, clogging most traffic movement there. Certainly these commuters won’t use their feet to reach their respective stops the private commuter transport will be used i.e Rickshaws, wagons, Taxis choking traffic further. Whatever happens with the commuters hanging on to the buses will be another issue. What will happen then will be build flyovers for normal traffic at each stop on this link.

Environmental & Health Risks:

As mentioned earlier most commuter traffic from other localities will be drawn on Murree road this will bring along immense pollution from the transport vehicles that includes NOX ,CO, SO2, VOCs. The environmental effects/ costs of these pollutants in long term must be calculated and in this scenario the most dangerous ( FMP) Finite Particulate Matter FPM (PM2.5) that includes metals, acids, carbon, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. In the given instance FMP won’t remain ‘diluted in space’ rather it will concentrate it directly on the population living around this route. Furthermore on this route there are hospitals, schools and thickly concentrated residential accommodation. How will the people living around these routes especially the Faizabad axis cope with the sever health problems caused by FPM? Has there been any study to exactly calculate the risks and long term health and environmental costs. Do we have a mitigation plan for this project to offset the risks I have just outlined?

Islamabad’s Environmental perspective:

Islamabad’s traffic scenario won’t be much different from the points raised above. 9^th avenue and Jinnah avenue will be converted into another Murree road and most residential sectors around 9^th Avenue with the same health and environmental risks that the population living on and around Murree road will face. In addition to this entering Islamabad from Rawalpindi has a different feeling suddenly the atmosphere changes from dense clogged small roads to a feeling of openness, greenery, pride and a sense of ownership. A 40 year old blue pine tree can absorb up to 48 pounds of CO₂ in a year. Furthermore it produces about 0.6 up to 0.9 pounds of Oxygen a day. The pine trees that you see/ or used to see on the green belts of 9^th Avenue were about 40 years old an estimated 1000 trees chopped from the 9^th Avenue and Jinnah Avenue. Will mean losing a CO₂ sink of about 3 tons each year and roughly about 1 ton of fresh oxygen. Not to mention all the dust and other pollutants concentration in to Islamabad’s atmosphere.

Conclusion:

While this project might benefit few hundred people commuting between twin cities the vast majority of the commuter traffic to and fro will not have any meaningful benefit from this project as they will be left out or they will have to arrange some sort of alternate transport to reach the metro stops from their respective localities, paying additional fares for transportation. Business owners along the Murree road will lose most of their customer base and people of Islamabad will have to pay additional chunks of money to support the subsidy given to the commuters in ticket fares and additional costs of maintaining the infrastructure, transport vehicles and labour costs. As far as I can see there are no alternatives to generate additional revenues to even make a breakeven except from the ticket fares. I sincerely hope this project does not become another white elephant for the future governments with everyone trying to blame their predecessors on the state of affairs.

Pashmina and Pakistan

Since childhood I have been watching the women in my family wearing beautiful shawls on winter gatherings from Lahore to Abbottabad and beyond. The feel of the fabric is soft, smooth and light. The embroidery on these shawls is immaculate. It takes your imagination right to the beauty of Sonamarg, Pahalgam and Gulmarg. The roar and tranquility of the tributaries of the mighty river Indus, Jhelum and Chenab. The fragrance of the pine trees, grass and wild blossoms spread all over the valley. The aroma of Safron (Zafran/Kaser) from Wazwan (traditional Kashmiri multi course meal) just when it is about to be served and the salty Sheer Chai (Kashmiri pink tea). Yes I am talking about the Pashmina fabric.

Pashmina fabric fetches between 160-200 million dollars in exports to India. Nepal exports stand between 80-100 million dollars and yet there is a new entrant China. The Pashmina goats shed their heavy winter coats in spring season starting off a harvest of the finest of strands from this goat’s wool.

 In the last 65 years Pakistan has not entered this potential market despite having geographically similar areas where Pashmina goats can be reared. In Pakistan areas within Kohistan, Swat, Kaghan, Naran, Upper Kurum and Chitral will have suitable conditions. In India and Nepal each house acts as an independent unit right from combing the goats for soft fibers of Pashmina wool, to weaving, dyeing and finishing. The skilled & crafty hand embroidery is truly a work of art. Nearly a million people from these two countries are associated with this business. The demand for this fabric as a status symbol has been established in most areas of Pakistan from pre-partition days. The price of the finished product says it all be it a scarf, Pheran/Kurta or a shawl. A simple Pashmina shawl with basic embroidery is sold between a range of Rs 35,000 to Rs. 50,000. In the Europe, USA and Canada they fetch much higher from $200 up to $600 a piece. The demand of Pashmina finished products within and outside Pakistan is huge.

 

We in Pakistan can also establish this cottage industry in the most underdeveloped, far flung areas of Pakistan. If I am not mistaken there are hundreds of rest houses and circuit houses in these areas. Why can’t some of them be dedicated to development of this industry? Yes there will be considerable initial investment and for that detailed feasibility studies have to be undertaken but atleast we should start thinking. All these potential areas have their unique and distinguished embroidery patterns. This can act as a barrier to youths abandoning ship and moving to populated cities to seek work as not many opportunities exist in these areas. This will also preserve the skill that is passed from generation to generation. 

Swat and Gilgit-Baltistan have the potential to establish research facilities for this industry as potential infrastructure and human capital exists to a certain extent; after all they were part and parcel of the ancient silk route. They can start with researching on goat breeds, fiber quality, location, infrastructure, market access, training, development and capacity building, finances, employment, resource/profit generation and continuous improvement.

Note: Only we in Democratic Pakistan can afford to spend around $1 Billion to build a ring road to the Shahi Darbar of our dear legally, constitutionally and morally elected Prime Minister his Excellency the great (Duke of Raiwind Sharif) Mr. Muhammad Nawaz Sharif. Plant Date trees in the center of a public motorway LHR-ISB-PESH uprooting the previous ones I am assuming at a huge cost. But beg USAID to give $50 million as seed money to research on cottage industry.

Islamabad slums thinking out of the Box

As reported in the media a recent survey on the ’Katchi Abadis’ in and around the capital is 24 with 13,521 families consisting of 84,591.They have been officially declared as a security risk and fast becoming hubs of notorious activities so they have to be dealt with as soon as possible it adds. This is indeed a big number. There resettlement and making them live like respectable ordinary citizens should be the prime responsibility of the State of Pakistan. This is the labour force that makes Islamabad look clean and green. What can be possible out of the box solutions for them so that they live as respectable citizens and keep contributing to Islamabad’s economy?

The sprouting up of huge housing schemes on the outskirts of Islamabad has been swift whatever the reasons for this might be they all have one thing in common they are not made for average lower middle class and middle class Pakistani citizens. To name a few the snobby Defence Housing Authority (DHA) Islamabad covering an area of 48951500 Sq Yards, The mighty Gulberg Greens (GG) farm housing scheme covering about 1931000 Sq.yards, another GG residential scheme covering up to 7500000 Sq. Yards, the elegant and neat Naval Anchorage 669500 Sq. Yards and believe me there are more the National Police Foundation, the exclusive Park Enclave and the one of its kind Naval Farm houses near the picturesque Simly Dam. Most of them with their own state of the art clubs, parks, business enclaves, some with golf courses. Then it’s the new sectors of CDA the Ezz, the Fs, the Gs.

My question why could the CDA just gift a small sector and construct cheap elegant housing for these people shifting them phase wise? Or better ask the owners of these huge residential estates to allocate at least 15,000 Sq. yards each to settle them.

This can solve the following problems for CDA i.e. most of the workers and families can be documented and registered. All foreigners from any country can be identified staying illegally. Since all of these mega housing schemes are gated with their own security mechanisms the movement of suspicious people can be under constant surveillance. This will also create job opportunities for them as most of these residential estates are in need of raw labour to work as maids, gardeners, drivers etc.

Now about who is going to fund all this, that is very simple I am sure many residing in the main sectors of Islamabad are not so poor citizens of Pakistan. I am sure CDA can tax a few owners of the commercial markets, the banks, the multinationals. I am sure most multinational companies that have their head offices in Blue Area and brag a lot about their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) can contribute handsome amounts to this initiative. I am sure many private donors running NGOs will now finally come to the help of these marginalized poor people instead of sitting in their cool offices writing reports to their head offices about community mobilization, gender equality, child labour etc. They can actually put their plans in to action.

All it needs is a proactive approach, thinking out of the box we are all citizens of Pakistan and everyone is entitled to live a peaceful life in this land of the pure.

Note: The cheers of Pakistan Zindabad, Jeve Jeve Pakistan by about 1 million Pakistanis still echo in slums of Dacca.

Metro Buss Islamabad-Rawalpindi-Another experiment in our strategic vision

Recently our worthy democratically elected government is embarking on an ambitious Rs 44 Billion  project to build a bridge that would connect Rawalpindi to the capital of Pakistan i.e. Islamabad via an overhead bridge on Murree Road with buses plying on it and entering in to the capital city via 9th avenue and finally culminating on Jinnah Avenue called the Metro Buss Project.

No doubt this will be a landmark project for the twin cities for commuters plying daily that go through a daily torture traveling between the twin cities through private public transport. In a nutshell  this project will have huge bridges with tarmacs and buses plying over them. This is my non expert development
opinion about the project in general .

Introduction to Rapid Mass Transport Systems: 
Let me give you a brief introduction to Rapid Transit for mass commuters. 

Rapid Transit is a concept we generally refer to high speed transportation systems using high speed trains/Trams carriages for commuters in densely populated urban areas. This brings in the rolling stock concept high speed train engines, carriages, tracks and stations both over ground and underground with multiple entries and exits. This is generally meant for middle/low income citizens that have to reach their respective work places on time. In the process they avoid road traffic; traffic jams, cost of owning a transport and cost of fuel to name a few.

Long Term and Short Term development plan: 
Long term and short term impacts of such projects should always be taken in to account. I also read that there has been an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) for this project and public hearings as well. In most countries such projects take years to plan chalking out each and every possible irritant and its mitigation once the project goes on line. We have to be super humans to plan and execute a project that will directly or indirectly affect the lives of at least a million people living in the twin cities in just 8 months. To my knowledge only the detailed project plan and FEED (Front end engineering and design) will take years to create. Let alone the actual implementation and then we have the everlasting threat of terrorism that might have over taken all other concerns to a genuinely civilized democratic dispensation.

To me if only buses have to be employed to reach a certain destination than anyone who has driven in Islamabad or has visited it must have noticed that on every main artery of Islamabad and Rawalpindi there are buss lanes why not spend a fraction of the amount being used for the project to effectively utilize them instead of making such a huge infrastructure. Why not ply these super sized Turkish buses on the same routes marking and improving the quality of buss stops on these routes.

Any thinking democratic government would have thought the sustainability of such a huge project. A mere EIA does not even count in such projects. Scenario planners, transportation planners, material planners, environmental planners work day and night to come to common understanding if we exclude economic and financial concerns.

Competitiveness and Human Capital Debate: 
While there are many things that can be debated one of my major concern is Pakistani Universities are producing technical graduates at a rapid pace. These technical graduates need to be provided with latest technology exposure so that they may become our future human capital. Nearly all developing countries bring in new technology to let their human capital grow with such projects. Giving you a simple example of a buss that will ply on this route what new technology does it bring with it? The buss will need a change of tires, clutch plates, seats, oil and filters. In technical layman terms it will need preventive maintenance. How many engineering fields are opening up to your young technical graduates in this scenario? How many if any of its components are from companies whose turnover is more than the entire GDP of Pakistan?

Foregoing other aspects that are beneficial from high speed metro train transit systems a minor example of the technology, it brings advanced electronics and signalling, composite materials for carriage, specialized steels for wheels and tracks. electrical panels of most advanced technology, braking systems that no one in Pakistan has seen before. Which companies will it bring in? Bombardier, Alstom, ABB, SKF to name a very few. There are hundreds of them in Canada, USA, Japan, France and Germany. All of them willing to be competitive if and when an opportunity arises bringing in their own set of technical expertise and investment to get a slight foothold in the market. Once these companies are here and few do become your trade partners they will look up to expand their market share for areas of growth and partnership. It can be joint research and development; it can be components to other industrial sectors that these companies produce; it can be job and growth opportunities for young graduates learning new technology design and commissioning. It is an opportunity for them to produce many components locally to achieve a competitive advantage. It can be a chance for our own industry to diversify themselves to producing components that they can compete with. I will give another example of this; from 2003 till 2008 many political economists criticized the state of economy making it consumption driven and what not without even factoring the price of oil that had jumped from $60 to a staggering $140 in just 4 months. Yes to a certain extent it was but just to make few eyebrows move compare a Dawlance fridge with a Haier fridge in 2003 now in 2014. Tell me what will be your personal preference if you live in Pakistan. Compare the quality and models of Hinopak truck/buss with an imported Nissan truck/buss in 2003 and now. There is a marked change in the locally built models of Paksuzuki, Gandhara Nissan, Atlas Honda and Indus Motors (Toyota). There is single factor competitiveness and competitiveness is the golden word driving innovation that in turn makes industrial growth sustainable, resilient and robust in long term.

While listening to various news channels some time ago when this project was under discussion, our democratically elected prime minister Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif of Raiwind approved the project on being informed that the bridge structure can also support a rail track in future. I was amazed at the sheer logic of this rationale it means we are planning such a huge infrastructure project only to adjust it in future to rolling stock (Metro Train) then why not plan it the way it will be utilized for ultimately why wasting such a huge chunk of public money now? Moreover will a single bridge manage to solve the problems of traffic and daily pains of most commuters coming from all different directions in to the capital to ride on a single track or its just a way of getting the staff of PM secretariat on time to salute their elected representatives? That too at the cost of uprooting one city called Rawalpindi and destroying the environment of the other called Islamabad. Did anyone of the said bureaucrats have the courage to put up the Islamabad master plan and if any such project is even allowed by CDA bypassing the master plan and CDA by laws. If this goes through next thing we will see is Islamabad ring road project. Now this ring road logic also comes from none other than the Halal dollars & date producing fields in kingdoms of Heaven. I am sure most of the readers can Google the ring roads in Riyadh, Jeddah, Kuwait, Abu Dhabi and Doha plus the lone obsolete Metro Buss project in Istanbul Turkey.

Till when will this country run on adhockism and personal whims of a few. Why cant we try to do things right from the start? Our dear minister for planning, development and institutional reform was part of this project’s clearance if this is the standard of planning of one of the most highly qualified lawmaker of the ruling party who also heads the planning commission imagine what must be going on in the finance ministry and state bank of Pakistan.

Note: A special note for our dear legally and constitutionally elected prime minister Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif (the duke of Raiwind Sharif). Islamabad is the only city in Pakistan that is neither a gift of a Mughal emperor nor a British general. It is the only indigenous city of Pakistan that Pakistanis from all ages & all walks of life take pride in please do not turn it in to another kingdom of heaven. In our country we are masters at developing to self destruction for the readers not long ago trams were in Karachi Saddar and a circular railway and Government Transport Service (GTS) existed. Unfortunately we are the only country in the world to have finished its public transport system instead of enhancing it.