While the Expressway was not allowed to subsidise costs through development, exactly the opposite was permitted for the sole patch of public parking space at the impossibly-crowded office area of Nariman Point. Here, the Piramal group was allowed to take over public space and build a mall and a multiplex in order to subsidise a multi-storeyed parking tower.

It has constructed an ill-designed facility with a narrow, winding path to the parking tower that does not allow large vehicles and SUVs to enter; its high parking charges also make a mockery of the cross subsidy plan. The consequence: shoppers and moviegoers have only added to the traffic congestion and pollution by idling and parking on the crowded road while seven floors of the eight-level parking are scandalously empty.

A third case, that has now been taken to court by Medha Patkar, relates to the glitzy Atria Mall, allowed to be set up at Worli on what is allegedly a plot reserved for housing. There have been open allegations about this plot having been quietly cleared because of the financial interest of a powerful Sena politician.

Similarly, the Pheonix Mill in the Lower Parel area is another piece of land that is continuously given clearances for new development. Staring with a bowling alley, a few restaurants and a single mall, it is now an unbearably crowded and noisy mess comprising three separate malls, scores of restaurants and is still in the process of constructing two large parking towers, more shopping and a six-screen multiplex.

... contd.