Context: An analysis of urban India’s need for sustainable mobility suggests that we must rely heavily on clean public transit systems.
Issues associated with transport sector in India
Transport contributes 10% of global emissions, and are rising faster than any other sectors.
Traffic saturation: Metropolitan cities are presently saturated with traffic.
Behavioural issues: Unauthorized street parking and avoidable traffic congestions.
Diminishing motivation to use public transport, walk or cycle.
Short sighted policies: Creation of new transport infrastructure for decongestion for temporary period.
Priority clashes: Preservation of environment vs developing new express ways.
Way Forward
Development of new ‘transit cities’: These are developed in response to traffic-saturation crises, where cars are considered a luxury instead of necessity, and focus on public-transport investments.
Characterized by a package of services so comprehensive, convenient and integrated.
Inclusive: Add value to majority of urban dwellers, as marginal social benefit of it seems to exceed its marginal social cost.
Transport needs greater emphasis on improving ‘mobility’ and ‘accessibility’: Mobility means focusing on efficient movement of people & goods with the help of public transport and accessibility is focusing on the reachability of destinations.
Road spaces must be reallocated for cars to reduce congestion delays, increase traffic speed and perhaps reduce overall traf?c levels by signi?cant amounts.
Improving public transport needs strong government support, with the aim to reduce private cars on streets, that could be achieved through time- and location-specific road and parking-slot pricing.
Promotion of footpaths and cycling tracks may complement expressways and streets, even as public transport is promoted.
It ensures redesigning timing, frequency and connectivityof public transport to synchronize the same with various other services such as Metro and monorail networks in metropolitan cities.
Promotion of transport-sector investmentsfavours environmental sustainability: For example, Delhi Metro earned carbon credits from the UN under its Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), and which other cities’ transit systems are exploring too.