‘Bengaluru is choked and crying out for help, put politics aside’: MP Tejasvi Surya highlights traffic issue

Tejasvi Surya also admitted that all governments that were and are in power failed in addressing this issue.

Bengaluru South MP and BJP leader Tejasvi Surya said that rising traffic issues in the city are alarming and urged Karnataka deputy CM DK Shivakumar to fix them by keeping politics aside. He highlighted that the city is crying for help and they can together improve the quality of life in the city.

‘Bengaluru is choked and crying out for help, put politics aside’: MP Tejasvi Surya highlights traffic issue

In a long X post, Surya wrote, “The traffic scene in Bengaluru is getting more distressing every passing day. Even Sundays, which used to be relatively easier, are becoming as nightmarish as the weekdays. Everyday, we are adding thousands of new private vehicles onto the roads which is only adding to the problem. Even running errands from neighbourhood stores takes so much time. The city roads, including the small lanes in residential areas, are way beyond its carrying capacity, and there is no space to make more roads. Anyway, more roads mean more private vehicles.”

He also admitted that all governments that were and are in power failed in addressing this issue. Surya also batted for Singapore-like restrictions on private vehicles and even the odd even method that did work in the national capital.

“Something drastic has to be done to address this. And it needs to be done NOW, with warlike urgency. We need to experiment with out-of-the-box solutions like the odd-even model or the Singapore model of limiting the number of cars or anything radical that works in the short term. In the long term, we need to double down on our investments and urgency on public transportation and drastically reduce private vehicles. Each person owing a private vehicle model will simply not work for a densely populated country like ours. The city is crying out for help. Our people, especially the middle class, needs us to act to improve their quality of life. We are spending more time in mind numbing traffic than with our family and loved ones,” he added.

He also urged DK Shivakumar to call for an urgent meeting with traffic management experts to fix the mess.