Municipal solid waste management of Patna

Abstract

Planning is a process of determining appropriate future action through a sequence of choices. To make these choices under certain conditions, planners need to collect comprehensive information about the past, the present, and try to predict the future, in order to make effective policy plans and decisions. Planning practice depends heavily on the availability and quality of Information. Moreover, the quality of planning and its decision process can be substantially improved when the required information is handled appropriately and efficiently. Clearly, then effective planning requires descriptive, predictive & prescriptive information inputs (Webster 1994). Solid waste has now become a major concern due to its effect on environment and psychology of the people residing in an area or the people visiting the area. For developing countries it is essential to use proper Solid waste management technique from the initial stage of development of the cities. If planning for the same is not done at initial stage then it results into huge investment of money and resource to mitigate the bad effects on environment. The composition of solid waste generated in the city is not only measure of economic condition of the people but it also delimitates the type and form of resources like amount of iron and plastic being used in the city. India is developing economically very fast and the living condition of the people is enhancing day. In nearly every city of India the amount of biodegradable, component of waste is 50% of total waste produced. There is no any system of segregation of biodegradables, resulting into decay of the putrescible part or the waste and spreading nuisance around the secondary collection point. Patna is the capital city of Bihar and is Centre of economic and commercial activities. Here also there is a lack of proper waste collection system and also the collected solid waste is dumped in the low lying areas along New Bypass Road (NH-30) and Ramachak Bariya. There inefficient utilization of manpower and infrastructure due to lack of accountability of staff. For making any intervention, it should be case specific and hence there was a need to identify, analyze & assess the existing condition. In order to do so a thorough understanding of all the functional elements or solid waste management were derived through literature studies. To improve the situation of Solid Waste Management of the city proposals have been given on the basis of observations made on the prevailing situation. First of all primary surveys were conducted to understand the problems regarding SWM of the city and it was found that most of the people were un satisfied with the time interval of collection of waste from secondary storage points. Also littering on roads is found to be common. The waste is being dumped illegally along in low lying areas. Analysis was carried out based on survey, data and maps and proposals have been given for implementation of segregation of waste at source and door to door collection of waste. Optimized route has been proposed for transportation of waste. Using GIS as a tool two pockets of land has been located to be used as landfill site based on superimposition of different maps and satisfying the criteria as mentioned in the manual of Ministry of Urban Development. Proposal has been given to divide the whole PMC area in to eight Municipal zones instead of four existing zones. Separate SWM department has been proposed with the organizational structure as mentioned in MoUD guidelines for MSWM.