How to make DTC buses cool for the new age Dilliwalas
Delhi's mobility mess is man-made. In planning for city's transportation, demand and supply has not been synchronised to benefit maximum commuters.
Besides, there are visible anomalies like ignorance to what the capital needs most not factored in by policymakers and the slack regulatory mechanism.
Sample this for understanding the situation better. The vehicular population of Delhi is 8.29 million vehicles (Delhi Statistical Handbook, 2014).
Do you know that despite capital wearing the "auto city tag" (primarily cars), nearly 44 per cent of its daily commuters do walking and cycling to work, followed by 33 per cent choosing public transport, mainly buses and Delhi Metro.
But do we care for walkers and cyclists in our road widening binge? Do we have enough buses or what have we done to encourage bus rides?
Nothing, sadly.
In fact, over the years the perception about the public buses, which started deteriorating with the "rogue Blue Lines" has only worsened with apathetic DTC management.
While travelling overseas, we Indians prefer buses as it is timely, safe, cheap and there are many ticket incentives and travel integration options to ferry you to different destinations on a single ticket. Can't we try that here in smart Delhi?
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Perhaps we can. The 126-page decongestion road map for Delhi prepared by the Union urban development ministry along with Delhi government, Delhi traffic police and several other departments linked to city's transportation offers a window to make it a workable option.
Significantly, the total passenger trips per day catered by buses are more than 60 per cent of the total public transport trips in Delhi, which is a significantly higher share than the Metro, at fraction of its cost.
What it lacks is a "modern face" to cater to new age commuters. There are many firsts suggested by the panel. Among these include: automatic fare collection system (AFCS) and a GPS-based vehicle monitoring and passenger information system in all public buses.
Incentives to bus passengers can help popularise its usage more, but everyone has taken buses as "poor Delhiites" mobility mode.
The UD ministry report says, the number of commuters can increase from 45 lakhs to 80 lakhs per day in a few years' time and incentives for bus users can be implemented wherein usage of more than 25 days a month may provide two to five days of additional travel.
Common mobility cards for easy use in bus, metro and taxi should be implemented along with the Passenger Information System (PIS); time-based ticketing should be introduced so that people changing between multiple bus routes to reach their final destination can travel on the same ticket with multiple interchanges.
But to do all this, we need at least 7,000 to 10,000 more buses. The time calls for investing in these public buses and not in flyovers and big road corridors.
Next comes the core problem which is centred on regulation and much is to be blamed on multiple agencies involved in city's transportation system. Can a city transport network function with as many as 18 agencies having their say in it?
Too many cooks spoil the broth, is an old saying. But it compels us to go to the basics of regulation where a unified command may do a better job.
Perhaps realising this, the UD ministry-led experts group had suggested for "a single lead agency that would take up the responsibility of managing a comprehensive responsibility of the transport system in Delhi".
The expert group had studied all the foreign models of a unified command like that of Transport for London (TFL), London, the Land Transport Authority (LTA), Singapore, TransLink, Vancouver, Canada and STIF, Paris, France and recommended for a similar single coordinating entity - Delhi Unified Metropolitan Transport Authority (DUMTA) - a single face for mobility in the city and the region.
This agency will be an apex body responsible for preparing a five-year investment plan for mobility in the city and the region; identify the agencies for investment plans, arrange the necessary funds and prepare budget for meeting the transport needs of Delhi.
(Courtesy of Mail Today.)