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There should be no extension northwards of the road already built to the
place of pilgrimage at Mandapeshwar. The really important roads in this area
are those leading from the railway stations to villages on the west coast ; those
should continue to be kept up to their full width. There is no objection to
the construction of small lengths of accommodation road, at the discretion of the
Officer in charge, Salsette Building Sites, for the benefit of existing groups of
villas badly needing an exit to the railway. But the principle should be
observed that their construction is not to encourage the formation of further
bungalows and a bazaar. Requests have been made for an English school at
Malád or Borivli, where a certain number of upper-class people do live all the
year round. This is contra-indicated on the same principle of non-encourage-
ment. It has also been proposed to utilize part of a charitable fund that exists
for the provision of dispensaries in Salsette, to establish one at Borivli. Strictly
speaking, the same objection should hold good in this case also, but it would
be rather paradoxical to object to the establishment of a dispensary in a place
because the neighbourhood was an unhealthy one. Borivli is a little market-
town for a great part of north-west Salsette, and a dispensary there would serve a
number of existing villages.
There now remain the two healthy areas of Salsette to be considered ;
that lying to the South of, and beyond the influence of the hills, and that
consisting of the islets of the west coast.
As regards the more immediate future the area in the South of Salsette
is the more important from the point of view of actual development. It
includes the Bándra-Dánda Peninsula, and its boundaries can easily be denned ;
they form a triangle. Andheri is for the B. B. and C. I. Railway what
Ghatkopar is for the G.I. P., the station on the border line, north of which the
country very rapidly becomes malarious. No development should ever take
place north of the metalled road that runs east from Andheri, and to go too far
east along this road would bring one too near the southern end of the hill
range. A line is best drawn from. Andheri to Old Kurla, to leave out any
country within the range of its influence. The base line of the triangle is
the Bándra Creek, and the third line is drawn to meet it from Andheri in the
direction of D anda, or of Bándra point.
The flats of the Bandra Creek extend for some little distance into this
area, and it is further limited by the existence of the danger zone of the rifle -
range, south of Santa Cruz Station, and the cantonment of Santa Cruz, near-
the village of Vakola, but these still leave a considerable area of ground, only
parts of which have been built over. The only reason why the rest has not
been considered in town-planning schemes, is that it lies more than a mile from,
the nearest railway station. There is none of it beyond the reach of the water-
supply scheme which is being prepared by the Engineer in charge, Salsette
Building Sites, so that the only problem is that of means of communication.
The problem would, of course, be most completely solved if it paid the
two railways, and if it suited their policy, to have a connecting line between,
say Kurla and Andheri, when electrification is brought in. Failing this, such.
an undertaking as a petrol tramway, to be constructed along one of the future
roads within the area, would best meet the difficulty. As regards roads, it
has to be remembered that, building apart, the present utter want of means of
communication between the two sides of Salsette Island is one that will have
to be fulfilled in any case. Strangers to Bándra can hardly believe that there
is no way to a town so close as Kurla, and that the Agra Road can only be
reached by long and circuitous routes, One of the roads that have been
provisionally suggested would continue the Bombay Improvement Trust's new
road on the west side of the G. I. P. Railway line from Kurla. Besides running
northwards to join the Agra Road it would have a branch crossing the head of
the creek and connecting up with the present road that runs westwards from
Santa Cruz Cantonment to the station and the Ghodbandar Road. Another
suggested road would run westwards from the acute bend of the Agra Road
north of old Kurla. Perhaps the most important of all the projected roads
is that which would run west of the narrow Ghodbandar Road northwards from
the Bándra Municipal Building towards Andheri,
H 629—7