Rs.748-crore draft plan for suburbs
Coimbatore Corporation Commissioner P. Muthuveeran explains a project drawn up for the suburbs at a meeting on Thursday.A Rs.748-crore draft plan has been drawn up for developing infrastructure in the suburbs here under the urban agglomeration component of the Union Government’s Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission.A meeting of elected heads and officials of three municipalities and 23 town panchayats was held on Thursday to present to them an overall project and cost outline prepared by a consultant appointed by the Coimbatore Corporation.The Corporation is the nodal agency for the suburbs, also called peri-urban areas because they are located along the city’s border. The Corporation has drawn up schemes for over Rs. 3,000 crore under the mission. But, the mission also calls for including the peri-urban areas as they become an extension of the cities because of rapid growth.Accordingly, an introductory session was held a month ago to help the suburban local bodies to familiarise with the mission schemes, the funding pattern and also list their requirements.
The consultant also made a survey of the local bodies and came out with a list of their basic requirements such as underground sewers, drinking water, solid waste management, storm water drains and improvements to slums.Corporation Commissioner and Nodal Officer P. Muthuveeran said the meeting on Thursday was organised to enable the local bodies know of the tentative plan and outlay and also to suggest more schemes as per their requirements so that these could be incorporated in the consultant’s report.Some heads of local bodies said the outlay in the presentation differed with their requirements or even with that of some of the schemes proposed already.
For instance, the Rs.1.83-crore outlay for drinking water supply in the Madukkarai Town Panchayat was incorrect, its president M. Salam Basha said.He asked the consultant whether the figure included the cost of a water scheme already approved.When the consultant said it was included, Mr. Basha said this was not an accurate figure as the cleared scheme’s cost itself was Rs.4 crore.Out of the tentative outlay of Rs.748 crore, road works take the highest share of Rs.200 crore because smooth flow of traffic within these local bodies and on roads connecting them with the city is among the priority areas.
The other schemes include (with outlays in brackets): drinking water supply (Rs.40 crore), underground sewers (Rs.174 crore), solid waste management (Rs.63 crore), storm water drains (Rs.60 crore), amenities in slums (Rs.83 crore) and houses for slum dwellers (Rs.120 crore) The Commissioner said that the project outline presented at the meeting was not final and that more projects could be added. Therefore, the figures mentioned would change when more discussions were held and more projects added.
Mr. Muthuveeran asked the consultant to provide a copy of the project outlay to each of the local bodies so that they could study it and submit their suggestions or objections.Some local bodies highlighted the schemes that they needed immediately because of new residential layouts coming up fast.“Our area needs a good solid waste management scheme,” Vadavalli Town Panchayat president Amirthavalli Shanmughasundaram said. “Space for disposal is hard to find in our town panchayat,” she said.As for converting garbage into manure, the consultant explained that the waste collected from all these suburban local bodies could be taken to a centralised composting plant on the Corporation compost yard at Vellalore.
The municipalities coming under the urban agglomeration scheme are: Kavundampalayam, Kurichi and Kuniamuthur. The town panchayats are: Chinnavedampatty, Kalapatty, Saravanampatty, Vellakinar, Thudialur, Vadavalli, Veerakeralam, Vellalore, Perur, Irugur, Vedapatti, Kannampalayam, Pallapalayam, Idigarai, Narasimhanaickenpalayam, Ettimadai, Periyanaickenpalayam, Sulur, No.4 Veerapandi and Madukkarai.
