“The purpose of the Smart Cities Mission is to drive economic growth and improve the quality of life of people by enabling local area development and harnessing technology, especially technology that leads to Smart outcomes.“, says the Smart City website (which btw is not very smart, a lot of main pages are not opening at all). Coimbatore has been chosen as a Smart City. And during the COVID lockdown, the roads around RS Puram, the area I live in, were dug up and some beautification happened. It was an improvement – aesthetics, benches, larger footpaths and such. The central chowk of the area has been given a vintage feel to engage the public and sitting areas have been added in. Seeing this actual improvement in Coimbatore, I got excited about the Smart City project.
Another wonderful initiative that is happening under this smart city initiative in Coimbatore is development around many lakes or kulams of the city. Earlier, I saw the walking track with an aesthetic design around the Ukkadam Valan lake. I thought it was great, but not that useful for me, as it was quite far from RS Puram. But since then, I have found that this kind of development is happening around a lot of lakes in the city including Kumaraswamy and Selvampathy lake which is quite close to RS Puram. And I will be able to walk down to it once it’s main gate opens up. Right now only one stretch is complete, but walking there is a bit difficult as it is on the other side from my area.
Selvachintamani kulam and Periya kulam both have these developments happening and part of the work is already complete. Ukkadam – Valankulam is also developed. Krishnampathi lake has developments taking place. And that area anyway, with the farm fields surrounding it is a lovely space.
Once all these lake tracks are in place, ideally, some walking paths connecting these various lakes will be created. Right now depending on the area, it is difficult. For example, walking from RS Puram via Kumaraswamy and Selvampathy lake track to Krishnampathy lake track, one could reach from RS Puram to Veerkelam or Vedapatti. This route, even now, with the partial work done could be an enjoyable experience depending on traffic situation.
However, the Periya kulam, Ukkadam and Selva Chintamani Kulam – though nearby to each other – are in some major trafficky areas. Which would not make for an enjoyable walk. This aspect remains to be addressed. Hope it will be soon.
So far, I have enjoyed these walking tracks quite a bit. And I am very glad these spaces are coming up in these numbers, improving the quality of life of the locals in the area. I hope they have a grander vision and develop it into something amazing.
Check my recent walk on Strava, where I made use of this Kumaraswamy walking track and did a 6 km loop which was also very interesting: https://www.strava.com/activities/7579976254
Running has picked up quite well in India in the last decade or so. Hope long distance walking can happen too very soon!
Another aspect they need to think about are the timings of the lake tracks. As of now they are only “officially open” for a few hours in the morning and few hours in the evening. I fail to see any point in this whatsoever. For sure, maintaining staff through out the day is not that expensive! Especially, with the weather Coimbatore has – they should keep these spaces open all day long. In fact, ensure shaded and other areas, so families and friends can enjoy even during mid-day and odd hours of the day!
Takes me back to my days in Taiwan – where I could count on cycle tracks and parks near the rivers that cut through the major cities of the country. Taipei has a 200+ km bike track in the center of the city because the space around the river has been claimed and developed so beautifully by the Government. This initiative is also tied to river pollution matters, and thus, clean water plus public infrastructural space has been facilitated by this development.
The Coimbatore lakes may have some pollution problem – saw this tweet earlier…
So, that is unfortunate. Hope government can address this as well.
Thus, is my report on the Coimbatore lakes and hopefully creation of a walkable city with this upcoming Lake infrastructure.
Bit different from the topic.
You tried visiting TNAU Botanical Garden? It is more than 100 years old and recently revamped.
From Lawley road stop it is at 1 km on the Maruthamalai road.
(I never visited though).