Reports by different global organisations predict that as the world gets richer, private car use will zoom ahead, especially among citizens of China and India. Beijing alone adds nearly 1,500 cars to its roads every day. Delhi is not far behind with 1,000 vehicles being added every day. Recent records of the ministry of road transport and highways show that last year, there were at least 1.7 crore private vehicles registered in India. What’s more, in the first 12 days of this year alone, over 3.6 lakh vehicles were registered in the country. Almost 90% of these were private vehicles.
If these kind of numbers continue, it’s a no-brainer that the world would be staring at a big crisis in the next 8-10 years. With more pressure on roads, the incidents of accidents and deaths are also set to increase. K K Kapila, chairman of International Road Federation (IRF) says that if the present trend continues, people dying on roads “could get doubled in the next 10 years.”
In this scenario, many countries are thinking of resorting to a vehicle freeze, that is putting a curb on the number of vehicles that can be purchased. But would such a concept work in India? Not really, say experts. “We can’t implement the vehicle freeze model like the west has done,” says urban transport planner N Ranganathan. “Western countries have started doing so after reaching a saturation point. India can very well manage 40 crore vehicles, that is four times the present number. But the challenge is to ensure that these numbers are uniformly distributed.” As of now, 10% of the total fleet is concentrated in big cities. Experts say state and city governments should have a strategy in place, to distribute the vehicle usage in three ways. First, they have to provide a mode of transport that takes care of work and education, which is 70-80% of the total number of passenger trips in any city. Secondly, peak period for traffic in mega cities needs to be staggered to eight hours. And finally, there is a need to provide road links in a manner that will discourage people to drive uni-directionally towards the central part of the cities.
Incidentally, Punjab has taken an initiative to reduce the number of vehicles which are plying on roads for over 15 years. In November last year, the state government issued notices to owners of all vehicles which were registered before 15 years to bring them for inspection. “Every product has an expiry date and so do the vehicles,” says Kamaljit Singh Soi, vice chairman of Punjab State Road Safety Council. “Old vehicles are invading our rural areas or are engaged in ferrying school children. They are like moving deaths on our roads. They should be converted to junk.”
BIG BOOMERS
Tamil Nadu 17,18,455 Uttar Pradesh 16,80,938 Maharashtra 16,73,542 Gujarat 10,89,115 Andhra Pradesh 10,03710 Delhi 4,66,705
Total vehicles registered in 2011
1,42,37,179
excludes data of RTOs which are not digitized.
If these kind of numbers continue, it’s a no-brainer that the world would be staring at a big crisis in the next 8-10 years. With more pressure on roads, the incidents of accidents and deaths are also set to increase. K K Kapila, chairman of International Road Federation (IRF) says that if the present trend continues, people dying on roads “could get doubled in the next 10 years.”
In this scenario, many countries are thinking of resorting to a vehicle freeze, that is putting a curb on the number of vehicles that can be purchased. But would such a concept work in India? Not really, say experts. “We can’t implement the vehicle freeze model like the west has done,” says urban transport planner N Ranganathan. “Western countries have started doing so after reaching a saturation point. India can very well manage 40 crore vehicles, that is four times the present number. But the challenge is to ensure that these numbers are uniformly distributed.” As of now, 10% of the total fleet is concentrated in big cities. Experts say state and city governments should have a strategy in place, to distribute the vehicle usage in three ways. First, they have to provide a mode of transport that takes care of work and education, which is 70-80% of the total number of passenger trips in any city. Secondly, peak period for traffic in mega cities needs to be staggered to eight hours. And finally, there is a need to provide road links in a manner that will discourage people to drive uni-directionally towards the central part of the cities.
Incidentally, Punjab has taken an initiative to reduce the number of vehicles which are plying on roads for over 15 years. In November last year, the state government issued notices to owners of all vehicles which were registered before 15 years to bring them for inspection. “Every product has an expiry date and so do the vehicles,” says Kamaljit Singh Soi, vice chairman of Punjab State Road Safety Council. “Old vehicles are invading our rural areas or are engaged in ferrying school children. They are like moving deaths on our roads. They should be converted to junk.”
BIG BOOMERS
Tamil Nadu 17,18,455 Uttar Pradesh 16,80,938 Maharashtra 16,73,542 Gujarat 10,89,115 Andhra Pradesh 10,03710 Delhi 4,66,705
Total vehicles registered in 2011
1,42,37,179
excludes data of RTOs which are not digitized.
No comments:
Post a Comment