Plans for an elevated road?

Madras Musings - We care for Madras that is Chennai

Government has announced a plan to build an elevated road connecting the Marina Light House and the East Coast Road (ECR). It has been announced that the proposed plan will improve connectivity between the city and the ECR and will ease traffic mobility. However, as is consistent with most Government plans of such a nature, environmental and aesthetic concerns have been given the go-by.

The entire road in its final form will extend 9.7 km and will be at a vertical clearance of 5.5m. The first phase will be for 4.7 km and will link the Light House on Kamaraj Salai (Beach Road) with Besant Nagar. A consulting agency has submitted its feasibility report and the estimate is that the first phase will cost Rs. 430 crore.

The route will begin from near the Gandhi statue, turn east near the Light House and run along the existing San Thomé Road bypass by the sea up to Srinivasapuram. From there it will cross the Adyar Estuary, run parallel to the broken bridge, pass the Theosophical Society campus and finally connect Besant Nagar near Elliot’s Beach. In the second phase, the elevated road will run along Besant Nagar Beach Road, close to Velankanni Church, and then run parallel to the coast before joining the ECR. Around 500 homes, 14 commercial buildings and three religious buildings will be affected by the plan.

The report does not look at what will happen to the already fragile ecology of the area. It also has not taken into cognisance CRZ guidelines which do not allow for such constructions along the coastline. The broken bridge which this road will pass close to is testimony to the destructive potential of cyclones and high waves in this region – not to mention the corrosive elements. Constructing a road in precisely the same area is nothing short of short-sighted ness.

The proposal will also ring the death knell for the entire Adyar estuary which was in the past considered a bird sanctuary. At present there is an ongoing project to develop what is left of the Adyar Creek as a natural estuarine park. What will the fate of this project be once a road cuts across the park and the estuarine area? The proposed road will affect what is an environmentally important region which has been recogni sed as such by the State and the Centre. The corridor is also to be located in the breeding ground of the Olive Ridley turtle.

The matter is not likely to end here, for it appears to be the opening for further land development. In the past, when the question of constructions close to the coastline near Quibble Island was investigated, the Government granted permission for the development stating that all this was taking place alongside an existing road and so the area did not come under CRZ guidelines. Now with another road being proposed along the sea coast itself, it is more or less certain that in future further reclamation and development will take place along the coast, citing the presence of the elevated road as an excuse. This will play havoc with the coastline and will also create a Shanghai-type of beachfront for the city. The question is, is this what we want?

Not surprisingly, the proposal has come in for scathing comment. The opponents have pointed out that the Government is spending vast amounts on beach beautification quite unnecessarily. If only this amount was spent on cleaning up the city’s waterways and making them navigable there would be ample scope for good connectivity from city centre
to the ECR. Where then would be the necessity for an elevated road? A waterway costs only one tenth of a roadway to maintain and is also more economical when it comes to fuel consumption. It would be the ideal solution for a city already polluted. But the present trend is more towards building massive flyovers and roads, all catering to a motorcar-using population when the majority that uses public transport and would benefit from a waterway is being neglected. When will those in power ever change this trend?

There seem to have been rumours of this since 2006. I came across this article the The Hindu.

Silence over project irks Information Commission

The winter visitors are here! � The Butterfly Diaries

The winter visitors are here! � The Butterfly Diaries

A  lovely piece!  You will enjoy reading this!

Vickie Henderson Art: I and the Bird #93: The Compelling Nature of Birds

Vickie Henderson Art: I and the Bird #93: The Compelling Nature of Birds

Take a look at Vickie's blog.  It hosts the 93rd birding blog carnival, and she has lovely whooping crane paintings as well!  The post on Sarus Cranes, I saw the tallest flying bird! is included in this carnival!

The bird that craved for a ramp

Darter, Snake bird, Pambuttara, Anhinga melanogaster...but to me it will always be the "fashion model" bird!  The waters and trees of Bharatpur are full of them. So "common" were they, that after a couple of days I stopped looking at them. Can you imagine, such a gorgeous bird, and I wouldn't give it a third look.
Photo by Mr Ramanan
A fashion critic could write," She had a lovely long neck, and the black silk saree 
with its beautiful white embroidery stood out under the ramp lights."!!  (The only thing is I dont know if its a she or a he!)

Isn't the photo above amazing?  All the features of the bird - its long snake-like neck, dagger-like bill and the wedge-shaped tail feathers - have been caught so well!

Photo by Sripad They adorned the trees all over, catching the sun to dry their wings. Everybody got great shots of these birds, and as I wondered about their vanity, Mr Chari gently mentioned that they were drying their wings because unlike water off a duck's back, the Darter's feathers do get wet, as they dive into the water in search of fish.

So it is that they spend their days, alternatively diving for fish and drying their wings!
Photo by Carthic

By the end of three days, I was able to do a pretty good imitation of the bird - ask Sripad!
Photo by Mr Ramanan
They are loners, hanging out on the trees alone, which is how we saw them most of the time.  Click on the photo to the left, and see its feet - duck like!

Carthic captured another unusual pose of this bird, as it stared into the water looking for fish.  Its got special neckbones that allows this almost unnatural-looking posture.

Photo by Carthic

Bharatpur
My photo of an Immature!

One mid morning, we came across this Darter, with an abnormally white neck. Old and grey I thought, but it was actually young and immature!!

Its the same bird, folks!

These shots are of the Snake-bird in the water.  It swims with its whole body submerged, looking like the periscope of a submarine!

As it swims, it keeps a keen eye out for the fish, which it chases with speed, shooting its bill out to spear and catch the hapless fish.  When we visited Dungarpur, in December, we saw this piece of hunting action.  The pictures below are from Vedanthangal.

Photos by Sekar
Salim Ali mentions another interesting feint.  If surprised while perched on a tree, it drops down through the branches, almost as if shot, into the water, surfacing at a safe distance.

They are found all over India - where's there's freshwater fish fish there's likely to be a Darter as well. 

Update:

On reading this, Mr Ramanan sent the following great sequence, shot at Vedanthangal. He adds:

As you have narrated about the hunting sequence of the darter, I thought I can share some of it here with you.The darter, unlike cormorants that hunt in flocks, hunts alone using its beak as a weapon to pierce the fish and bring it up. As it has to swallow the head part of the fish first, it tosses and sees that the head goes into mouth first. After feeding, it spreads its feather to dry and also cleans it beak as it contains lot of oily secretions derived while swallowing the fish. These all are 'ACTION SHOTS' for a greedy photographer like me. I have some of them here, which I have photographed at Vedanthangal on various occasions.

Exactly as we saw in Dungarpur!  Thank you Mr Ramanan!

(This is part of a series of posts on a week spent at the Keoladeo sanctuary, in Bharatpur Rajasthan.  To start at the beginning, click here.)

The Baya weaver and other discoveries

Here are the birds that I saw for the first time during the Chennai Bird Race. The Baya Weavers were in a palm tree

A Baya Weaver
Photos by Sekar

, on the road to the Vedanthangal sanctuary, after the turn-off from the highway, before the temple.

The tree was full of these birds and their nests!  I've seen empty nests before, close to Pulicat, but this was the first time I saw the birds and the nests in use.  We saw a couple of males who have a lovely yellow cap and breast during breeding, but I think this one is a female.

Mr Baya is rather industrious.  He weaves this nest from paddy reeds and other grass.  He also has a regular harem, with several wives and a separate nest for each one!  Now the interesting thing is, he weaves several of these halfway (like the one in the picture) and then has to await approval of the Mrs!  A prospective Mrs Baya comes along takes a look inside while the anxious male waits outside.  If she approves of his weaving skills, she occupies the nest, completes it, and then lays the eggs inside, taking full responsibility of incubating them! Then, our cheery Mr Baya goes off and looks for more wives with more half-finished nests!!  

What interesting lives in my environment, and I didn't know about this until now!  The finished nest has a passage that goes upwards into the egg chamber, and its so secure that snakes cannot get at the eggs.  Click here for more details on the nest and some great pictures and drawings of completed nests.

Glossy Ibis
Photos by Sekar

The Glossy Ibis was my second new "discovery" at Vedanthangal, actually in the fields surrounding the protected sanctuary. This is the adult in breeding plumage, and the sun caught the colours quite spectacularly.  

The Glossy Ibis, if I'm not mistaken, is a winter visitor, and a glamorous one at that.  As I watched it, intent on feeding in the fields I had this image of a serious and ponderous gent all dressed up for a music kutcheri but more interested in the newspaper in his lap!

Painted stork
Photos by Sekar

The slow, stalking movements take away from my pre-conceived image of grace! Quite similar to the painted stork, so beautifully captured in this photo taken within the sanctuary. Such lovely colours and such an elegant pose - like a fashion model on the ramp, but then there's an awkwardness to their gait and a certain silliness when they clack their beaks that takes away from the image!  Maybe thats why Ranjit Lal christened the Prime Minister in his Crow Chronicles as Pinky Stink Tainted Storkji!

I am reading the book, set in Bharatpur, and the bird personalities are so apt, that I think I'm going to write a couple of posts based on that book!

And late in the evening, I finally saw a Common Hawk Cuckoo, also known as the Brainfever bird!  In Kanha, in the summer of 2005, they called out to us, from all over the forest, but maddeningly, I never did get a good sight of them, as they hid in the foliage, or took off just when I sighted them.  So, four years later, I look up into the foliage, and I saw a juvenile just sitting there, quietly.  No call.  I would've missed it entirely if I had not glanced upwards.  They call mainly in the summer and are largely silent in the winter.  

Sripad's got this great shot as it feeds on its favourite food - hairy caterpillars!  

Brain-fever bird

For more of Sripad's bird race pictures click here.  

For more of our pictures from Vedanthangal, click here.