Campaign partners:
Dehradun Citizens Forum
Demands:
Re-evaluate and reconsider the Rispana-Bindal Elevated Corridor
Conduct an exhaustive environmental and social impact assessment before taking any further measures
Make the Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) and Detailed Project Report (DPR) available in public domain
Conduct a transparent public consultation
Consider alternatives to resolving traffic congestion such as expanding and modernising public transport, making traffic management more efficient, ridding the city of encroachments that lead to congestion
Focus on rejuvenation and reviving existing rivers, rather than concretising them
Decision makers:
Chief Minister of Uttarakhand, Pushkar Singh Dhami
Public Works Department, Uttarakhand
National Highways Authority of India
Nitin Gadkari, Minister of Road Transport and Highways of India
Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change
The government of Uttarakhand has proposed an elevated corridor in Dehradun. The project will involve construction in the city’s two riverbeds – Rispana and Bindal. The proposed Rispana-Bindal Elevated Corridor (RBEC), which is being touted as a solution to Dehradun’s acute traffic problem, is a disaster in the making.
It is crucial to understand that Dehradun is a part of a declared eco fragile zone according to the Doon Valley Notification 1989. Implementing mammoth, ill-planned, ecologically destructive infrastructure projects in eco fragile zones pose dangers not just to the city’s ecology but also to its very existence. A Dehradun-Mussoorie ropeway is also in the pipeline, enhancing connectivity to the hill station.
Dehradun is already bearing the brunt of overtourism and faces civic issues like lack of proper Solid Waste Management, inadequate drainage system and traffic mismanagement. The relentless monsoons of 2025 have further exposed the city’s vulnerabilities, highlighting the urgent need to address civic infrastructure failure to be better prepared for natural calamities.
The elevated corridor will comprise two flyovers of 26 kilometres with hundreds of concrete pillars laid inside the two riverbeds.
But this project will have massive consequences, including the death of two rivers, an exacerbated risk of flooding, heightened seismic activity threat, loss of thousands of trees and aquatic life, and countless families that will be displaced – without clear plans of rehabilitation.
Unintended consequences?
The tourist traffic from the Delhi-Dehradun expressway will add to the traffic on this corridor, which is expected to carry 20,000 vehicles per day. Furthermore, Mussoorie, a famous hill tourist destination a stone’s throw away from Dehradun, already sees over 6,000 vehicles a day – a metric way beyond its carrying capacity. With the proposed elevated corridors, the ease and access to the hill station will become seamless, though indirectly, inducing demands for tourists and encouraging more people to flock to the hills.
We have all borne witness to the floods in Uttarakhand, which year-after-year, claim countless lives and cause damages that are irreversible!
Implications for Dehradun
The RBEC will transform Dehradun into a virtual construction site, with the proposed construction set to take at least 4 years to complete. This will make air pollution worse and choke the city’s traffic! The city is already experiencing severe traffic bottlenecks at areas like Asharodi, Sai Temple, Lalpul, Rajpur, Bindal Tiraha. These will become worse with the introduction of the RBEC.
Misplaced priorities
The proposed RBEC is slated to cost a staggering ₹6,200 Cr. The funds must, instead, be used to strengthen recommendations of the Comprehensive Mobility Plan (CMP). These include a robust and sustainable public transport, in a bid to reduce dependence on private vehicles and in-turn reduce congestion. This can be achieved by introducing subsidised electric buses and the neo-metro system.
Our demands
We are urging the authorities to re-evaluate and reconsider this ambitious proposal. At this juncture, when Dehradun in specific and Uttarakhand in general are in the wake of acute climate-change induced trouble, the city cannot afford to kill and concretise two rivers that were once slated for rejuvenation. Rivers help recharge groundwater and often act as sponges in times of floods. The implications of axing thousands of trees and suffocating aquatic life-forms will be terrible for the city’s ecological balance.
An exhaustive Environment and Social Impact Assessment must be conducted at the earliest, the Detailed Project Report must be made available to the public and the public must be consulted before any further decisions are made!
In August 2025, there was momentary relief when the Uttarakhand High Court ordered fresh public hearings on the RBEC in response to a PIL filed by a social activist, with the next hearing scheduled for September 2025.
Join us in rejecting the RBEC in its present form and in-turn saving Dehradun from disaster!
Sources:
HC pause on Rispana-Bindal hearings gives 2,500 families reprieve | Dehradun News - Times of India
Why Doon Must Rethink Rispana & Bindal Elevated Corridor Project | Garhwal Post
Campaign partners:
Dehradun Citizens Forum
Demands:
Re-evaluate and reconsider the Rispana-Bindal Elevated Corridor
Conduct an exhaustive environmental and social impact assessment before taking any further measures
Make the Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) and Detailed Project Report (DPR) available in public domain
Conduct a transparent public consultation
Consider alternatives to resolving traffic congestion such as expanding and modernising public transport, making traffic management more efficient, ridding the city of encroachments that lead to congestion
Focus on rejuvenation and reviving existing rivers, rather than concretising them
Decision makers:
Chief Minister of Uttarakhand, Pushkar Singh Dhami
Public Works Department, Uttarakhand
National Highways Authority of India
Nitin Gadkari, Minister of Road Transport and Highways of India
Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change
The government of Uttarakhand has proposed an elevated corridor in Dehradun. The project will involve construction in the city’s two riverbeds – Rispana and Bindal. The proposed Rispana-Bindal Elevated Corridor (RBEC), which is being touted as a solution to Dehradun’s acute traffic problem, is a disaster in the making.
It is crucial to understand that Dehradun is a part of a declared eco fragile zone according to the Doon Valley Notification 1989. Implementing mammoth, ill-planned, ecologically destructive infrastructure projects in eco fragile zones pose dangers not just to the city’s ecology but also to its very existence. A Dehradun-Mussoorie ropeway is also in the pipeline, enhancing connectivity to the hill station.
Dehradun is already bearing the brunt of overtourism and faces civic issues like lack of proper Solid Waste Management, inadequate drainage system and traffic mismanagement. The relentless monsoons of 2025 have further exposed the city’s vulnerabilities, highlighting the urgent need to address civic infrastructure failure to be better prepared for natural calamities.
The elevated corridor will comprise two flyovers of 26 kilometres with hundreds of concrete pillars laid inside the two riverbeds.
But this project will have massive consequences, including the death of two rivers, an exacerbated risk of flooding, heightened seismic activity threat, loss of thousands of trees and aquatic life, and countless families that will be displaced – without clear plans of rehabilitation.
Unintended consequences?
The tourist traffic from the Delhi-Dehradun expressway will add to the traffic on this corridor, which is expected to carry 20,000 vehicles per day. Furthermore, Mussoorie, a famous hill tourist destination a stone’s throw away from Dehradun, already sees over 6,000 vehicles a day – a metric way beyond its carrying capacity. With the proposed elevated corridors, the ease and access to the hill station will become seamless, though indirectly, inducing demands for tourists and encouraging more people to flock to the hills.
We have all borne witness to the floods in Uttarakhand, which year-after-year, claim countless lives and cause damages that are irreversible!
Implications for Dehradun
The RBEC will transform Dehradun into a virtual construction site, with the proposed construction set to take at least 4 years to complete. This will make air pollution worse and choke the city’s traffic! The city is already experiencing severe traffic bottlenecks at areas like Asharodi, Sai Temple, Lalpul, Rajpur, Bindal Tiraha. These will become worse with the introduction of the RBEC.
Misplaced priorities
The proposed RBEC is slated to cost a staggering ₹6,200 Cr. The funds must, instead, be used to strengthen recommendations of the Comprehensive Mobility Plan (CMP). These include a robust and sustainable public transport, in a bid to reduce dependence on private vehicles and in-turn reduce congestion. This can be achieved by introducing subsidised electric buses and the neo-metro system.
Our demands
We are urging the authorities to re-evaluate and reconsider this ambitious proposal. At this juncture, when Dehradun in specific and Uttarakhand in general are in the wake of acute climate-change induced trouble, the city cannot afford to kill and concretise two rivers that were once slated for rejuvenation. Rivers help recharge groundwater and often act as sponges in times of floods. The implications of axing thousands of trees and suffocating aquatic life-forms will be terrible for the city’s ecological balance.
An exhaustive Environment and Social Impact Assessment must be conducted at the earliest, the Detailed Project Report must be made available to the public and the public must be consulted before any further decisions are made!
In August 2025, there was momentary relief when the Uttarakhand High Court ordered fresh public hearings on the RBEC in response to a PIL filed by a social activist, with the next hearing scheduled for September 2025.
Join us in rejecting the RBEC in its present form and in-turn saving Dehradun from disaster!
Sources:
HC pause on Rispana-Bindal hearings gives 2,500 families reprieve | Dehradun News - Times of India
Why Doon Must Rethink Rispana & Bindal Elevated Corridor Project | Garhwal Post