February 1, 2024

A Stroll by the Lake

After a week or so of research, brainstorming, and survey development, the Sensing Local team set out toward Ulsoor Lake to conduct our first of many audits of one of Bangalore’s many urban lakes. Opening to the public only at 4:00 PM, our group made our way through the gates as they opened to a nearly depopulated walking track and lakefront. First impressions were pleasant surprises: we were greeted with well-maintained footpaths and lakesides that presented no strong odors and relatively little waste buildup. We then start our audit, assessing the visible infrastructure in the immediate area: lights, gates, fences, guard station, etc… Heading northwest on the footpath, we quickly come across a few sectioned areas of the lake which are fed by two major stormwater inlets. The first was a conflicting sight: beautiful white egrets and purple swamphens wade through shallow, eutrophic, trash-littered ponds. Further along the path, we find an engineered wetland, meant to treat the summer monsoon rains but now only a trickle remains, surrounded by all sorts of trash. Shortly thereafter, a playground comes into view that is flanked by a razor wire-topped wall. Unable to continue any further, we take a shortcut across a fire-scarred and trash-littered island, passing by two apparent string fishermen and across the riprap walls that separate the confinement areas. Now heading southbound along the Western side of Ulsoor lake, we come across a well-used medium sized open-air gym that seemed to cater to both the young and old. Not even 20 meters past the gym came the strong smell of sewage that seemed to follow until the walking path’s terminus at the south end of the lake. The lake was full of opposites: beautiful and ugly, sturdy and shoddy, young and old. This relatively small lake seemed to be a microcosm of our experience thus far; dichotomies that exist all at once in the same place all mixed together. Extreme wealth and poverty, modern and ancient, progressive and traditional, hot and… hot. You get the idea. I don’t really have any profound ideas or conclusions to draw from this but these were just a few things I noticed during my stroll by the lake.

By Yak