The wheel - which we call chakra - is therefore seen in our State Emblem, which dates back to Ashokan times (4th century BC), right at the base. This chakra is a spoked wheel - that is, its design is that of "hub-and-spoke." It was a very advanced wheel. A horse and an ox are also depicted - because the spoked wheel increased their efficiency.
Now, hub-and-spokes are basic to transportation systems. Such systems evolve to carry goods from the place of production to the place of consumption - that is, from the fields and the farms to the cities and their markets. Cities become hubs - and spokes are built into the countryside. Thus, "all roads lead to Rome." And, in Old Delhi, the various "gates" of the ancient city lead to destinations in the manner of spokes from a hub.
Hubs-and-spokes are seen even in civil aviation. Every major airline has a home airport which serves as its hub. It is from these hubs that flights take off to various destinations, which lie on spokes.
Ditto for the railways - and their "junctions."
Funnily enough, the layout of the Lutyens' Bungalow Zone (LBZ) in Nude Elly is also a hub-and-spoke design. The LBZ is where all our ministers and top officials live. When chacha manmohan leaves his residence on Race Course Road to go to his office in South Block, he immediately encounters the Akbar Road roundabout, from which one spoke leads to Indira Gandhi's old house on Safdarjung Road, and another spoke leads to Nehru's house on Teen Murti Road. There are two more roads leading out of this roundabout. Hubs-and-spokes are what the LBZ is all about.
With the chakra on the State Emblem, and chakras on the road layout in the LBZ, one would think this "design" ought to penetrate the minds of our "planners" - especially those who plan transport networks.
Yet, when we look at their most ambitious highway project, we do not find this design. Rather, we find a "quadrilateral." What kind of stupid design is that?
Indeed, the road layout of the rest of Nude Elly (a "new city") is along the pattern of multiple T-junctions! No hubs-and-spokes here. Not even the standard "grid pattern." This faulty road design is why Nude Elly is doomed to eternal traffic snarls. The city must either be abandoned - or re-built.
The British built 80 "hill stations" in 50 years using a hub-and-spoke design for transportation. These 80 hill stations - a tremendous burst of urbanisation - were all linked to their "primary city" (which was the hub) by spokes:
- Poona, Mahabaleshwar, Matheran, Lonavla, Khandala, Panchgani - were on spokes leading out of Bombay.
- Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Shillong - on spokes leading out of Calcutta.
- Ooty and Kodaikanal on spokes leading out of Madras.
- Simla, Kasauli, Mussoorie, Dehra Doon, Nainital, Landsdowne on spokes leading out of Delhi.
Today, all the primary cities are overcrowded and close to collapse, as are all the wonderful hill-stations. In the meanwhile, all urbanisation has stopped - because the Gandhian State pursues nonsensical "rural development." Summer is here - and there are no pretty hill stations for us to holiday in any more.
Of course, we could build many new cities and towns, and new hill stations too, if we fixed our transport system. It must be HUBS-and-SPOKES - the chakra. Only then will thousands of "satellite towns" develop around the cities. The cities will decongest. And we will all have some lebensraum. The whole of India will become a great piece of real estate.
And as for all these blind planners of Hindostan:
Throw them out of the LBZ!
(Read the second part of this post here.)
Sauvik ji, this is a great post. I enjoyed this new perspective on Chakra. You are right, this is the way roads need to be designed. The british have built more infrastructure for our country than any government before or after then. This is the sad truth.
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