[sustran] article

[Carlos Cordero Velásquez]

Dear sustraners,

below an intreresting article about indian cities and  cars, taken from
CSE's News Bulletin

regards, Carlos

&&&



Down To Earth editorial: Cars, more cars

I recently visited Bangalore, Chennai and Mumbai. The singular impression
I have of all these cities, and of others I occasionally visit - of course
the one I live in, Delhi - is one of noise, pollution, plastic, garbage
and filth. But most of all what hits you is cities overrun by vehicles;
cars, more cars. Every city is now bumper to bumper. Even Bangalore, the
sanctuary city, is a car-mess.

This nightmare has crept upon us, insidiously. Most people living in
cities cannot even
comprehend, let alone contest, this change. The pace has now swamped us.
When my colleague Anil Agarwal made presentations to the Indian parliament
in the mid-1980s about India's environmental challenges, he found no
reason to speak of urban chaos and its deadly impacts. It was not there to
see, then. So, this change is really the story of the last 15 years. In
other words, it is an ecological history old enough for us to lament
about. But isn't it young enough for us to rectify?

Over the last 15 years, is it only that we have intensified our efforts
towards economic growth? Or is it that we have intensified growth without
public action? It is fair to ask: if the consequence of this growth is not
intentional, then what has government after government been up to? Did
they ever exist?

Let's stick to transport. Take any city's data: the increase in number of
vehicles far outstrips growth in human population. Chennai, for instance,
has seen a 10 per cent growth in people and a staggering 108 per cent
growth in on-road private vehicles in the last decade.

I do not think this is accidental. Private vehicle growth has paralleled
decline in public transport. Ahmedabad in 1990 had almost 800 buses, or
roughly 23 buses per 100,000 people. In the early 1980s, the situation was
better: 30 buses per 100,000 people. But by 2003, the city had barely 400
operational buses. The ratio now? Less than 9 buses per 100,000 people.
Only Delhi - because of the Supreme Court order, ironically, that mandated
10,000 buses running on clean fuel - has substantially increased its
fleet.

At this point, many might argue that population growth is inevitable. What
can city planners do? Human population growth may be ordained. The growth
of private vehicles is certainly not. Remember, the decline in public
transport leaves people with no choice but to move towards private
vehicles. In all these cities, as public transport has declined, people
have moved towards two-wheelers and cars. In the jargon of transport
planners, there has occurred a substantial modal shift in transportation
in these cities!

I remember reading, many years ago, how the automobile industry of the us
had deliberately bought out the railways and the tramways, so that it
could decimate its competitors. In India, as usual, the story is simpler.
Private interests have gained from the destruction of public service. But
they have not had to invest in this destruction. The wound is officially
self-inflicted. The last 15 years are about neglect and apathy. And no
interest that speaks for the public good any more. Another indication of
the total collapse of government.

The change from public to private came, in India, with setting up the
public sector company Maruti - what an irony! - with the imperative of
making the car affordable for all Indians. Maruti, since then, has been
joined by a horde of other car-makers, all competing to make the car more
sexy and more glamorous. They have done well; indeed, made the car or
scooter every Indians' dream-turned-reality. But this 'revolution' has
come at a deadly cost.

The problem is not that there are sellers of cars. The problem is that
there are no sellers of public transport. Worse, even its 'owners' have
become its enemy. In most cities, bus fleets run not as transportation
companies, but as employment services. Ahmedabad, for instance, has 8,000
employees to run its mere 400-odd buses. Its owner, the government, will
not sack these employees. And it certainly will not invest in
improvements. In fact, what it will do is to argue, vociferously, that it
has no money to invest in public transportation. It is, after all, a poor
government of a poor country. But this would be more than complete
falsehood.

Let me explain. First, every city reluctant to invest in public transport
is busy building flyovers to take care of burgeoning traffic. This, when
it knows flyovers never solved the problem anywhere. They are like the
proverbial Internet, where points of traffic jam shift; even as you invest
in more space, cars fill it up. The answer to congestion is not more road
space, but less.

But more on misleading 'sarkari' economics. Delhi, for instance, according
to government documents, is building 42 new structures, which will cost
the exchequer nothing less than Rs 500 crore. Now, we know that private
vehicles control over 90 per cent of the road space in our cities.
Therefore, this is a subsidy for this mode of transport. On the other
hand, the same money spent on public transport would have substantially
upgraded services for all.

Secondly, and shockingly, private vehicles pay less road tax than public
transport vehicles. So, let us be clear that this is a mockery of
economics; here, the poor support the rich.

But in case these facts make you believe public transport is not used in
our cities, let me correct this. It is true that private vehicles
constitute over 90 per cent of all vehicles in our cities. But it is also
true that in many cities, public transport, however it may exist, still
moves over 50-70 per cent of commuters. In other words, this is not the
story of the us, where the car replaced the bus. It is the story of poor
cities - Bangalore, Chennai, Pune - of a poor country, where the poor have
not become rich.

They have only been neglected. Murderously so.

Read the complete editorial online >>
http://www.downtoearth.org.in/cover_nl.asp?mode=2

Write to the editor: editor at downtoearth.org.in


Carlos Cordero Velásquez
CICLORED - Centro de Asesoría
y Capacitación para el Transporte
y Ambiente

Pasaje Lavalle 110 -
Lima 04
Perú

telf: (51 1) 4671322