Outlining a three-pronged strategy, the advisory talks of urban transport interventions that need to be taken in a short-term of six months, medium-term of a year and long-term of one to three years.
Estimating that the “90 per cent dip” in public transport ridership volumes during the lockdown is unlikely to pick up any time soon, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs has called on states and Union Territories to come up with “alternative modes of transport” and “encourage and revive Non-Motorised Transport (NMT)” such as bicycles.
“Re-establishing the earlier level of ridership in public transport is a big challenge for cities, as people may be looking for more options, especially personal modes that allow for safer travel in the post lockdown scenario… Such dramatic and dynamic changes in demand and supply will require complementing these public transport systems with alternative modes of transit,” says the advisory, signed by Secretary Durga Shankar Mishra.
The advisory says the “sense of insecurity in the minds of the public in travelling in public transport during these testing times” will in all probability lead to an increase in the number of private vehicles on the road, which, in turn, will add to pollution and “eat away space for other modes of public transport besides adversely affecting road safety”.
It goes on to estimate that Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) and Metro rails in urban centres are likely to get only 25 to 50 per cent of pre-Covid ridership. With 10 million passengers on these systems daily, that could leave 5-7.5 million people needing new forms of transportation, the document said.
