[sustran] Fw: [sustran] Re: Ridership predictions, urban rail transit

kisan mehta kisansbc at vsnl.com
Sun Oct 21 23:59:37 JST 2001


----- Original Message -----
From: kisan mehta <kisansbc at vsnl.com>
To: <sustran-discuss at jca.ax.apc.org>
Sent: Sunday, October 21, 2001 7:31 PM
Subject: [sustran] Ridership predictions, urban rail transit


Dear Sustran Colleagues,
>
> I am amazed by the lively discussion on studies taken
up on rail services. Majority of them talk of underutlisation
of facilities planned and/or created.
>
> In Mumbai, the situation is different.  Basic Suburban
Railway Services in Mumbai built in the Thirties.
This helped the city to grow along the railway corridor between Fifties and
Eighties.  Amalgmation of small
municipalities of the then suburbs with that of Island City accelerated the
expansion or rather sprawl of the city.
>From a mere 800,000 in 1901 Mumbai touched in March
2001 12 million staying on 434 sq km area with a suffocating average density
27,000 persons per sq km.
>
> The Island City is losing in population in favour of
erstwhile suburbs.  Trading activities are concentrated
in the Island City.  So long train and bus journeys. An
estimated 55% of Mumbai's jobs are provided by
people living outside the Island City.

Mumbai does not have metro or adequate extension
of suburban railways.  Railway and bus services
provide about 10 million journeys a day.  Both
services are crowded to a suffocation level at four
times the normal capacity.  Trains run so jam packed
that they say proverbially that a commuter would not
be able to move his wrist away even if he feels his
wrist watch being pinched.

Railways are owned by the Indian Government and
Buses by the municipality.  We wonder whether
sophisticated travel demand management concepts
have any relevance at all in human centres of the
developing countries.

With globalisation and free market access operating
on full scale, the government priority in the so
called developing (respectable designation for poor)
countries is motor roads and expressways.  The
Maharashtra Government built about 80 km of
the 160 km of Mumbai Pune Road at the cost of Rs
16 billion. Toll from motor cars using the facility
does not cover even the interest cost of Rs 2.4
billion. The Finance Minister admited the other day
that the expressway has proved to be financially
unviable.  Best wishes.

Kisan Mehta  kisansbc at vsnl.com





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