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The Dutch initiative
The jubiliant team.
THE PROBLEM of traffic congestion the Kochiites suffer and the concern over it isn't limited to the city alone. There are many others who are directly or indirectly associated with the process of finding a solution to this problem that serves as an anathema to this unique city.
The involvement of the Dutch in designing a world-class roundabout at Pachalam, where traffic snarls have become the order of the day, was heard for long. And it has become a project for Dutch students of civil engineering to put themselves to test.
A four-member student team from the Delf University of Technology, the oldest and the largest technical university in the Netherlands which currently celebrates its 32nd quinquennium, has completed its project on the possibilities of constructing a roundabout at Pachalam and is packing its bags.
If internationalisation is the quinquennial theme of the university, the project done by Elsbeth Quispel, Sophie Smit, Marjolijn Beekmans and Noor Hellemans in Kochi reflects it.
Ms. Quispel and friends were ecstatic on the eve of their saying good-bye to Kochi. So was Roads and Bridges Development Corporation of Kerala Ltd. (RBDCK), the project undertaker which facilitated the study by the Dutch students of civil engineering and construction management.
Speaking in clear English, the students found no hassles in telling what their study yielded. Everyone knows there are some who oppose the proposed project. Certainly they will be outnumbered by those who favour it, said Ms. Smit.
After working on several alternatives, the team has suggested a model which the RBDCK may adopt depending on its feasibility, financial and otherwise. But on the eve of their departure, the team was more enthusiastic to talk about their experiences in Kochi than about the project they did.
The roads and traffic systems in the city are the most curious for them. `Can't imagine something like giving signals with the hand outside this place,' said Ms. Hellemans, apparently tongue in cheek.
Coming from a country half of whose land mass lies below sea level, with millions of blooming tulips, windmills and dikes, and a marvellous system of canals, mills, lochs and dams, the Dutch girls weren't all that excited about Kochi. But only till they saw it.
`It's marvellous... we didn't expect it to be so charming,' said Ms. Beekmans. During the past two months, the girls on Sundays went to explore Kerala and were wowed by the elephants of Guruvayoor as well as the traditional aura of the State capital.
Indeed they were amazed by the segregation of men and women in public places, especially in buses. Women sitting in the front with the men behind in buses is something they couldn't digest. Certainly the free girls who come from a land where the residents are not shocked by the annual gay parade, will find it strange. And this year's Canal Parade scheduled to be held in less than a month, the girls wonder whether they can watch the carnival from the bridges on the Prinsengracht or from the quay at the Muziektheather.
By Abdul Latheef Naha
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Life
Chennai
Coimbatore
Delhi
Hyderabad
Kochi
Thiruvananthapuram
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