Bhubaneswar: Bhubaneswar Development Authority (BDA) has deployed 10 JCBs and more than 200 workers and the entire team is working on mission mode to revive the major parks across the city. The green lungs of Bhubaneswar had lost their greenery and infrastructures to the furious strike of the severe cyclonic storm Fani on May 3.
While the walking and jogging tracks, open air gymnasiums, kids’ play areas and the lawns are now free from the green debris and fallen trees, frequent visitors have started coming to their favourite timeout zones.
BDA’s 10 major parks with over 5 acres land each include Biju Patnaik Park, Indira Gandhi Park, Buddha Jayanti Park, Mahatma Gandhi Park, Kelucharan Mohapatra Park, Kharvel Park, Madhusudan Das Park, Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose Park and K8 Kalinga Nagar Park and Shyama Prasad Mukharjee Park. During the severe cyclonic storm Fani all the parks were devastated and the infrastructures were damaged.
Sources said the damage was so severe that after deploying nearly 80 people for last two days till this evening more than 200 trips of tractor loads of green waste were collected from Biju Patnaik Park alone. “More green waste would be there and it will take several days till all the garbage are lifted from Biju Patnaik Park alone. All major parks combined, it will take some time to bring the entire infra to normalcy,’’ said a BDA official.
It can be mentioned here that there are more than 120 parks across the city. While BDA has 57 parks, the rest 63 belongs to Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation. However, while BDA manages the big/central parks, the small and community and colony–based parks are managed by BMC.
Nrupakishore Patnaik, a senior citizen from Pokhariput area said “ we are extremely happy that the city agencies have worked tirelessly to retrieve the green spaces from the irreparable loss as the city had lost over 50 percent big trees and many plantation. The park authority should plan more saplings”.
Poonam Parida, a student of NIT Rourkela, who has come to her home in Bhubaneswar following a break from studies, said “the open air gyms are very helpful in having good physique and mind. I am happy that we are able to use the equipment after the cyclone.
It would be pertinent to mention here that the extra load of green waste from the road side and city parks have put an extra load on the temporary transit station (TTS) near Sainik School. The TTS is operating in a 24X7 format to facilitate collections and the transportation of the green waste to the designated dumping ground on the city outskirts near Bhuasuni.
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