Had Enough of Monorail, Now Suck on Some Light Rail

Three years ago, people in Trivandrum (and Calicut) were thrown a bone by the Chief Dream Merchant (CdM), which we all lapped up (see Monorail for Tvm, 2011). The Railway God had appeared to him (maybe in his dream – him being the dream merchant – or maybe in person; nobody knows) and said a monorail is what these people need.

Lo and behold, there were colorful images of monorails in all newspapers warming the cockles and other unmentionable parts of Trivandrumites. We were glad that the Lord upgraded us from MEMU trains and buses to this modern contraption. Soon, the coffers of DMRC, the temple trust looking after the Lord’s interests, began filling up with consultancy offerings. DPRs (not related to DPR Korea) were prepared, alignments were marked, and historical buildings were threatened – all in paper. People were given controlled doses of euphoria-generating news featuring unauthorized copies of monorail pictures from the web, which kept them baying for more.

But this God is a playful one. He likes to toy with his devotees. And so it came to pass after three years – no, not the monorail, but the reappearance of the Lord. He suddenly revealed himself again, appearing through the monorail woodwork, to the CdM, and said, “#$%! monorail. I’ll upgrade them to a light metro rail, whatever that is”. The CdM said, “Thy wish is my command. I’ll immediately convey it to the suckers. They’ll be grateful to you for not smiting them”. Both of them sneaked a peek at the consultancy coffer and laughed maniacally (ref: Consultancy fees to DMRC).

The people were happy that their prayers and offerings have “paid off”, just like with the other gods. In the meantime, unbeknownst to man, the Lord has different plans, which he revealed to the CdM (and to me). Three years from now he plans to upgrade the plan to a full-fledged metro. And in 2020, it’ll be upgraded to a subterranean maglev bullet train, and in 2023 he will smite us all because a few of us will sin by not going orgasmic about the newest plan. The Lord moves in mysterious tracks! So, beware! You might get run over!

 

 

Trivandrum Monorail – “To be or not to be a Paara”

When god speaketh, man shuts the f$@k up-eth. That is the norm. But unbeknownst to god, there are a set of people called rationalists who ask for logical, plausible explanations. These people raise uncomfortable questions, which usually bring any discussion to an abrupt end with, “that is our belief, you can’t question that.”

Recently, railway god E. Sreedharan spake and spake and spake a lot to his devotee chief minister. And then he spake and spake some more.  And everybody bowed and prayed. He spake about the wisdom of building a monorail for a growing city like my hometown. And, everybody nodded in agreement, “sorry lord, we forgot your advice on widening the roads in Trivandrum and using the existing railway tracks and buses. A thousand apologies.”

The railway god apparently had no recollection of ever saying such things. Do gods get dementia? He now wants to build something bigger and better than a monorail. A metro, perhaps, as the city is growing. On the other hand, I guess Calicut only needs a monorail as it won’t grow. What about the other two cities “larger” than Trivandrum? Malappuram, if you believe the stats, is the Shenzhen of India – growing from a hundred thousand to a million and a half in a few years. At this rate, it could be a megalopolis pretty soon. Obviously, the people there deserve a modern “maglev”. We are yet to hear god’s thoughts on that.

This god-speak, however, raised alarms. And surprise of surprise, a dissenting voice came from the devotee group itself. Mr. M. A. Vahid, a ruling party MLA, boldly came out as an atheist and suggested, without naming names, that somebody is trying to torpedo the project. There were some mute denials from the government. And I patted my back for predicting this – see Did you just Wink?.  

To be or not to be a paara, that is the question on the railway god’s mind now (paara, പാര is a Malayalam word used to describe someone who slyly tries to #$ck up something). He definitely seems to have an axe to grind as far as Trivandrum is concerned. I could never understand the deification of this guy (or anyone for that matter). He didn’t invent or create anything from scratch. He used existing technologies and equipment to build something for which a blueprint has been in existence for 150 years. The world’s first frikkin' metro started running in London in 1863, for (railway) god's sake! The Delhi metro is reasonably good and he should be complemented for good administration and execution of a project. An Indian world-class, if you may, like the Trivandrum “world-class” International Airport or the CWG village, (see Our Standards) which are a big improvement on existing facilities. That’s about it.

In the meantime, the stink continues in Trivandrum, with our Mayor-ess Ms. Moonlight and our MP Mr. Moon Tha Roor throwing muck at each other. Interesting times ahead.

Maglev, Trivandrum Monorail, Railway God and Confucius

A picture is worth a thousand words (in some versions it is 10,000 words). This saying, I found out after painstaking research that involved googling it, was an American creation slyly attributed to Confucius to make it sound convincing. I was reminded of this quote when I saw some impressive pictures of cities in Kerala. Stunning high-rises, coconut trees and shimmering backwaters! The only problem is that these pictures are worth only about 250 words (or 2,500, whichever you prefer), or only about a quarter of what Confucius meant. None of these pictures show the streets, the grounds, the earth on which these buildings stand, for obvious reasons. It is not a pretty sight. But, I assume that is what tourism hyperbole is all about. Confucius, if he comes back now, would be shocked to learn that fishing nets from his country are being used to catch foreign tourists in a distant land.

Recently I read a comment (about Gurgaon) that you have to keep your eyesight angled up by about 40 degrees and you may be tempted to believe that you’re in some 1^st world city. A similar comment was made by a Japanese guy to me many moons ago.  He said that Trivandrum looked better than Hawaii from the air. But then there was a pause, and in typical Japanese fashion, a lot was left unsaid. An American would have probably said, “yea, we got down and that was when the $hit hit the ceiling literally.” You can’t walk 10 metres or take in a panoramic view without being jarred by piles of garbage, ugly buildings, and eye-piercing colours. When did purple and parrot green become our state colours? I missed that revolution. There was a time, in my youth, when we used to (ignorantly) call any colour that is not white or its derivatives as “pandi colour”, a derogatory reference to the colourful Tamil scene. I don’t feel that way now as far as Tamils are concerned, because now I realize that such colours suit them, and their personae. Likewise, their rhythm, the beats, and the sound. Those look and sound fabulous in Tamil, but don’t work in Malayalam. Still, Tamil being the bigger cultural entity around seems to have had a bigger, detrimental impact on Kerala in the last decade than I had imagined.  (And, if I ever get my hands on the Asian Paints guys, I’ll kick them till they turn purple.)

Well, I lost track. I wanted to write about garbage-free Kerala. But then, it is a futile exercise. There was a garbage-free Kerala plan initiated by the previous government 4-5 years ago, which was thrown into the trash can after the first few days. The new plan is also destined to take the same route by the look of things, with a slight detour where a CIAL-like entity will make some money in the process.

Couple of follow-up news regarding Trivandrum monorail and railways.

Our CM has become such a visionary he has become almost Palin-esque (Sarah Palin – An US politician who said she could see Russia from Alaska) in his vision thingy. He could, sitting in his perch in the Cliff House, see all the way to Kaliyikkavila in the south and all the way up to Thalapadi in the north, to which he plans to extend the Trivandrum monorail. He is not even winking any more.

While the CM was at it and thinking up ways to carve up the state booty among corporate sleazebags as quickly as possible, the railway god revealed his plans for using maglev at Kochi. The news report quoted him as saying this technology is widely used in Japan. Now, that was taking it a bit too far even for a god, especially, in this information age. The only maglev system commercially operating in Japan is a contraption they developed for the Nagoya Expo, which they are continuing to use over an 8-kilometre stretch at great loss. The only other and oft-quoted example is the one in Shanghai that connects the city to the airport. Again, not a metro system. He said the maglev can run at speeds above 500 km/h. Now, how that is beneficial in a metro system with stops every kilometre is beyond my comprehension. But it is god’s words and you have to take it as it is.

Today you see the news that the Japanese maglev will be used for the high speed railway system in Kerala. Again, the system this guy is talking about is not operational on a commercial basis. The Japanese do have a test line in Yamanashi and have touched speeds well in excess of 500 km/h, but the way he talks about it is similar to the earlier-mentioned saying attributed to Confucius by the American. Enhances the credibility. He and the media, however, seem to be ignorant of this big world-wide internet webby thing. Interesting days ahead.