Spider Glass

Me, GM Suman Neogy and PM Basu: Today on a boom lift

Today, I along with Suman Neogy, GM Hidco and Basu, PM L&T inspected the quality of Spider glazing in the facade glazing using spider glass hardware.

Spider Fitting

What is spider glazing? Spider glazing is an option available for the larger opening elevation in the exterior and entrance of large buildings, an option that does not require framing with steel / metal and so is more obstruction-less, allowing better view both from inside and outside. Spider glazing act as structural support for any high-end exterior design. Spider glazing hardware fittings, toughened glass and various other components are involved in spider glazing concepts. Of course, in still larger spaces non-spider conventional framed glass panels are also being used.

We used a special boom lift that was brought in from Mumbai recently to the project site of the State Convention Centre. The view from the top was quite spectacular.

We also decided that the Convention Centre will be Wi Fi enabled and that the bandwidth will be provided from the Biswa Bangla Wi Fi that is already there in the Major Arterial Road in from of the Convention Centre.

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Clippings:

Asian Age dt 13 Feb 2017

Khabar 365 dt 13 Feb 2017

Millennium Post dt 13 Feb 2017

Telegraph dt 13 Feb 2017

Mix the City : Kolkata (2)

Please see the earlier post on this here .

Yesterday, the film shooting took place at Eco Park's Bamboo Garden. A Photo on my mobile:

The Bitish Council Team at Eco Park on 11 Feb 2017

I recorded a bit of Subir Roy's flute. Here is the link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70o-_yIJsZg . The project would be ready by September.

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Clippings:

Millennium Post dt 12 Feb 2017

Times of India dt 12 Feb 2017

Anandabazar dt 12 Feb 2017

Ebela dt 12 Feb 2017

Solar Dome in Eco Park: Work Starts

ED WBSEDCL, ED Bridge and Roof, me, CMD WBSEDCL Rajesh Pandey
 at site today (11 Feb 2017)

Work commenced today morning with beaking of coconut shells and a Bhumi Puja at Eco Park site. The site is close to Herbal Garden, across the water body. The hemi-spheric dome will have a ground level diameter of 45 m, mostly crystalline solar panels and glass panels connected to the power lines through a net metering mechanism so that it will be an net energy positive enclosure. It will be 27 m tall and will have three levels of exhibition space connected through a spiral ramp along the dome and a central lift. The top level will offer a spectacular viewing gallery. The first level will showcase few exhibits on green city while other levels will concentrate on art and culture. Here are few artist's impressions:

It is expected that the project will be completed by next year.

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Clippings:

Millennium Post dt 11 Feb 2017

Telegraph dt 11 Feb 2017

Sukhabar dt 11 Feb 2017

Silver Green New Town

'IGBC Green Cities' rating system is a voluntory and consensus based programme. It is the first of its kind in India and addresses environmental sustainability in emerging cities. We subjected New Town to its rating system to know how New Town stands and what needs to be done. We just got a feasibility report from our consultants. They have opined after months of study that New Town is already fit to achieve a Silver Rating under the IGBC Programme and just has to register and apply in the prescribed manner to IGBC. But, according to the consultants, with a few more steps, it could also get the gold/ platinum status. I give below a scan of the concluding portion of the report of the consultant:

Extracts from "Feasibility Report for IGBC Green Cities Rating of New Town
by
VK:e environmental LLP (8 Feb 2017)

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Clipping:

Millennium Post dt 10 Feb 2017

Cable drive

Meeting with cable / fibre owners at Nabadigata
today (poor pic quality: apologies)

We held a longish meeting with all cable operators of Sector 5 and discussed action plans to take up one road (Wipro More to Ring Road via College More) to be free of cables hanging on light poles. Operators explained that almost 50% of the cables hanging from the poles were non-functioning because in case of faults, it was often easier to string in a new cable rather than locate and repair a fault amidst many other cable lines. Engineers and officers of NDITA were present. We explained that 6 inch diameter cables were already laid on this road. Operators however seemed to prefer the New Town model where individula ducts were provided to different companies.

It was explained that the junction boxes would be covered within a fortnight. It was agreed that all operators would give their requirements to a joint committee that was formed in the meeting within a week, cable-drawing within the duct would be organised by NDITA, that outputs were available in each plot, that additional cross-overs would be given if so required, That a a WhatsApp group would be used to keep in touch with the committee members, that price adjustments would be allowed by NDITA if required for someone who'd already paid for underground independent ducting whose validity had not expired, that after the pilot project their further inputs would be taken.

We targeted the last Sunday of February to be the start of field work.
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Clipping:

Ebela dt 9 Feb 2017

Preparatory Happiness Workshop in March

Dr Joy Sen of IIT, Kgp (extreme right) and at Hidco today, 8 Feb 2017

Dr Joy Sen, Prof IIT Kgp and others met me today at Hidco to discuss about the preparatory workshop on Happiness indexation of New Town. I informed them that yesterday, I'd had a detailed interaction with Prof Priyadarshi Pattanaik of Reiki Centre of Happiness of IIT at Hidco and that we'd decided that the workshop might be held on any date between 15-17 March 2017, depending on the travel plans of Mr Reiki from the USA.

The workshop will have a couple of expert talks on the theme of happiness. It will also be the forum where (a) we will briefly share ideas about Happy City and (b) IIT Kharagpur will make a presentation of its proposed project (for discussion and finalization with experts). We will also look into the possibility of inviting, or interacting over Skype, with the the Happiness consultants of the Amaravati project.
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Clippings:

Bartaman dt 8 Feb 2017

Times of India dt 8th Feb 2017

Khabar 365 dt 8 Feb 2017

Aajkal dt 8 Feb 2017

Pratidin dt 8 Feb 2017

Mix-The-City-Kolkata

Subir Ray, an iconic flautist, will record music for Mix-The-City-Kolkata  on Saturday, 11 February 2017, 2 PM onward at Eco Park. Mix-The-City is a British Council digital music project which involves 12 popular musicians recording their work in 12 iconic locations across the city. Following this, the recording of their work is put up on the Mix-The-City website for web users to interact with the recordings and create their own composition. You can create a Mix by clicking here .

The Mix projects have occurred across the world and British Council will be developing a version for Kolkata. Hidco would be a partner. British Council's musicians from the project will play for recording at the Eco Park. Eco Park will be geo-tagged and the recording will feature the location’s detail on digital print.
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Clippings:

(Top and Below)
Millennium Post dt 7 February 2017

(Top and below)
Bartaman dt 7 Feb 2017

H E High Commissioner of Canada to lead discussion

The Indo-Canadian Business Chamber will hold an interactive business roundtable on 22nd February 2017 at Kolkata. The roundtable forum will be attended by H.E. Nadir Patel, High Commissioner of Canada to India . This is a follow-up of the MoU signed between Hidco and Indo-Canadian Chamber of Commerce at BGBS 2017 on 21 Jan 2017. There will be a few of the Canadian Companies which have the relevant expertise required by HIDCO in the development of New Town.
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Clippings:

Times of India dt 6 Feb 2017

Snehodiya

Work of Snehodiya, the hotel-like home for Seniors, has started in full swing. It is located just across the street of Swapna Bhor Seniors' Park so that there is synergy between the two. All concrete piles have been built as per design and a load testing will be done next week. I visited the site office yesterday:

Snehodiya Site, yesterday 4th Feb 2017

At the Kolkata Book Fair's Hidco Stall, a "coming soon" booklet is on display. Its cover looks as follows:

Information Booklet at Kolkata Book Fair released earlier by MInister Firhad Hakim

 The information booklet shows the location map, interior lay out plan, few 3D views and says as follows:
"... There will be a G+10 main building and a two storied guest house. Each floor from first to eighth, of main building will have double bedded / single bedded rooms with drawing / pantry space and balcony, attached toilet. In each floor, there will be attendant's room, common pantry, spacious sitting place. The ninth and tenth floors are premium floors. There are 94 single bedded rooms and 55 double bedded rooms. The project is scheduled to be completed by 2018...".
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Clipping:

Millennium Post dt 5 February 2017

SHGs in Retail Food

Street-Side Food Court near Eco Space, New Town: nearing completion 

In the last meeting of the Board of NKDA, we decided that the Food Court near TCS/ Eco Space roundabout being built by NKDA would be made over to the District Administration to enable Self Help Groups of nearby village women to run the stalls. This is a part of a strategy to recognise street economy and attempt to formalize it.

There are many unplanned shanties serving food to IT personnel on roadside opposite to Eco Space and near TCS campus in New Town's Action Area 2. This shows that the zone is very profitable for food vendors. So a new structure with public conveniences has been built where SHGs will run their own food business at subsidized rent so that not only will they will do a business that works but also will, hopefully, wean away people from the shanty-like food kiosks on roadside.

We took a slightly different strategy for roadside stalls near Unitech IT complex. We, from NKDA, built, in consultation with the vendors, a planned food court and all have now shifted there. The frontage - where the black shanties stood earlier - is a green garden now.

For Action Area 1, a food court has been built by NKDA some time ago near the office of DC Police. Now we just formed a committee to see how the stalls in the food court can be effectively used to provide citizens what they want (neighbourhood food / vegetable etc stalls) in a planned manner.

All these are, of course, in addition to the 8 formal markets that have already been built all across New Town, markets that houses xerox shops to medical polyclinics, from Kathleen Cakes to Mother Dairy outlets.

In Sector 5, we are planning to create a food hub in a parking lot of one acre size (plot AQ 11) where parking will be in several levels while food stalls will be at the ground / street level. Design process is going on.

Meanwhile, in accordance with a Board decision of NDITA, an Expression of Interest has been invited for getting a consultant for surveying and making a plan for rehabilitating existing roadside foodstalls in Sector 5: the EoI notice can be seen at http://ndita.org/egovernance/images/stories/NIT_27.PDF

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Clipping:

Millennium Post dt 4 February 2017

Wi Fi in Business Club

New Restaurant on top of Gym

The New Town Business Club has been connected to Biswa Bangla network and is now Wi Fi enabled. There will be no charges inside the club premises although the speed will be reduced after a certain amount of usage.

We decided to commence swimming sessions in the Club from 1st April; applications for slots would be on a first-come-first basis and would be taken from March 2017. We decided to allow access to swimmers and their companions to the new restaurant on top of the gym. We decided to organise weekly cultural events for members every Saturday at 7.30pm or so. We decided to have a table tennis tournament soon for members. We decided to send membership kits by courier to whomsoever had not been able to collect. We decided to monitor the construction of the indoor badminton and squash courts. We decided to explore the possibility of having a shooting zone.



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Clippings:

Salt Lake Telegraph dt 3 Feb 2017

Convention Centre : Tyre Killer

Picture of Tyre Killer (from net)

On the matter of State Convention Centre, we had an interaction today with DG(Security), CP(Bidhannagar) and other senior police officers on the one hand and L&T, DMA, Hidco Engineers and expert consultants on various proposals including locations of CCTVs, DFMDs, Car Chassis Scanners, Electronic Frisking, Security Control Room, Tyre Killers at main road entrance, Boom Barriers and even fire exits and perimeter walls. There was a site inspection thereafter.
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Clippings:

toi.in/VIGB0a/a18ag

Aajkal dt 2 Feb 2017

Khabar 365 dt 2 Feb 2017

Wayfinding

Wayfinding refers to information systems that guide people through a physical environment and enhance their understanding and experience of the space.

In the workshop on Future Cities, it was highlighted that human behaviour should be used more often as a urban design tool. As a first step, we are designing wayfinding signages that will have emphasis equally on pedestrians as well as vehicles.

Motorists typically like to relate to distance to be covered. Pedestrians relate to "time-to destination" while on foot. Vehicles want to know about streets, pedestrians on maps.

These thoughts have led us to draw up a new set of signages for Sector 5 Nabadiganta township. Here is a first design that is being worked upon by engineers of Nabadiganta Intustrial Township Authority (NDITA):

Design of Wayfinding in Nabadiganta Township

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Clippings:

Millenium Post dt 1 Feb 2017

Khabar 365 dt 1 Feb 2017

Khabar 365 dt 1 Feb 2017

Ei Samay dt 1 Feb 2017

Ei Samay dt 1 Feb 2017

Khabar 365 dt 1 Feb 2017