kolkata with no one thinking of new projects after the left fronts debacle in the lok sabha polls the transport department is now all set to commission the elevated pedestrian plaza along the b b ganguly street to check everincreasing accidents on the road that also witnesses heavy pedestrian as well as vehicular trafficthe project the department feels would ease traffic along the busy road to a great extent we were about to commission the plaza before the election but abandoned it as the election dates were announced just then said a transport department official when built it would be the citys first pedestrian plaza designed to alleviate the plight of 350000 pedestrians and over 50000 motorists who use b b ganguly street every weekday either to reach sealdah station or to enter the city from itofficials assured that construction of the plaza would be executed in a manner that would neither hinder movement of traffic nor create problems for owners of roadside shops and local residents the pillars of the pedestrian plaza to be built on a portaltype frame would be on the pavements with escalators on either end of dalhousie and sealdah the elevated plaza would have a fibre glass cover to make a walk along it a pleasant experience even when it is scorching hot or raining cats and dogs there would be some food and drink kiosks all along the plazasaid chief traffic and transport engineer b k sadhuone of the oldest and most decayed streets of the city b b ganguly street formerly lalbazar street is a pedestrians nightmare the road is dotted with landmarks like city police headquarters government offices educational institutions hospitals and business establishmentsin fact on this 22km stretch of b b ganguly street between sealdah and dalhousie square pedestrians far outnumber the vehicular traffic during peak hours from 9 to 1130 in the morning and from 5 to 7 in the evening most of these pedestrians are those who work in the business district add to this the crowd of the citys biggest wholesale market the crowd of the baithakhana bazar which comes mostly from the suburbstransport department officials say that earlier there had been plans to dedicate b b ganguly street exclusively for pedestrian traffic but as this was one of the citys arterial roads and considering calcuttas shrinking road space the idea had to be abandonedofficials recall that it was during a visit by a japanese business delegation almost a decade ago that the idea was first floated the japanese subsequently got busy with the six flyovers crisscrossing calcuttas busy intersectionssince the late 80s different planning options were considered it finally emerged that an appropriate solution would be to segregate pedestrians from vehicular traffic by sending the former above the surface level a ground level conveyor belt was even thought of construction of an elevated pedestrian plaza connecting sealdah station with bbd bag was included in the feasibility report of the kolkata transport infrastructure development project with its high