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Headline : No public transport? 

Intro:Cars are swamping roads at an unprecedented rate, outstripping the
increase in road space. The results are congestion, reduced mobility and
rising air pollution. Yet cars have not replaced buses, which carry the
bulk of the population. sumana narayanan reports Indian cities
desperately need to build a public transit system and also give it a
right of way 




On April 21, a small stretch of road in a congested corner of south
Delhi, one of the most polluted cities in the world, turned into an
epicentre of chaos, confusion and downright indignation. The 5.6 km
stretch was where the pilot phase of a public transport system that
allows buses to operate on a right of way separated from other traffic,
was opened. As vehicles strayed into wrong lanes and cars piled up in
long queues for the first few days, the media unleashed relentless
criticism, calling the project corridor of chaos, ill-conceived, a
blunder and demanding that it be scrapped. Car users and residents’
welfare associations of colonies along the stretch also attacked the new
system—Bus Rapid Transit (brt)—aimed at improving traffic flow. It did
not ease traffic; instead it caused more traffic snarls, they said.
People in cars and riding motorcycles felt road space had been “stolen”
from them by creating a separate dedicated lane for buses.

In this great outcry fact was difficult to separate from fury. To cut
through the noise and confusion, one needs to understand the concept of
brt. Conventional road planning is geared towards motorized vehicles and
caters to their needs by increasing road space and building flyovers and
underpasses. But in Indian cities the majority of the people travel by
public transport (mainly buses), bicycle or on foot. brt aims at
ensuring an equitable sharing of road space and safety by segregating
traffic into different lanes depending on their speed and function.
Buses, for example, stop regularly for passengers while cars and
motorcycles need to keep moving. So a bus that halts, blocks the left
lane and causes the vehicles behind it to try and merge with the right
lane, thus, slowing down traffic. Also, non-motorized traffic, which
prefers to hug the left lane, blocks buses from pulling into the bus
stops, so buses just stop in the middle of the road. And amid all this,
bus passengers must negotiate traffic to board buses. The results:
underused or unused road space, slow traffic movement and increased risk
for pedestrians and non-motorized vehicles.

Moving buses into a separate lane prevents them from coming into
conflict with other traffic, so they get a dedicated lane in the centre.
Non-motorized vehicles are given a lane on the extreme left since they
are vulnerable amid motorized vehicles and tend to slow down motorized
vehicles. Further left, the pedestrians have a well-paved, low pavement.

Why BRT?
Delhi needs a dedicated bus lane because 60 per cent people in the city
travel on buses. With Delhi’s population growing at the rate of 3.85 per
year, only a robust public transport can ensure mobility. There is a
limit to the number of cars roads can accommodate. Already 21 per cent
of Delhi’s area is under roads—a high percentage compared to other
cities worldwide. 

brt is also a step towards cleaning Delhi’s air. According to the
Economic Survey of Delhi, the city had 1.60 million cars and 3.34
million two-wheelers in 2006-07. The number of city buses was only
8,000. Every day, 1,000 vehicles are added to the city’s roads. Where
will it lead to? Due to the spurt in cars, Delhi has already squandered
its gains from switching to cng. Air pollution levels that had dropped
from 140 microgramme per cubic metre (µg/cu m) in 2002 to 100 µg/cu m in
2005 due to the introduction of cng, are again on the rise. In 2007, the
pollution level was up at 155 µg/cu m. With increasing traffic jams and
rising pollution what choices does Delhi have? Personal vehicles are
part of the problem, not solution. 

It was to avoid this dead end that Delhi planned a network of brt, metro
and monorail.


	 
	 
	 
The Committee on Sustainable Transport headed by the Delhi chief
secretary has recommended building 14 brt corridors across the city by
2020. Designed and developed by the Transportation Research and Injury
Prevention Programme (tripp) at iit Delhi, brt is based on the
successful Bogota (Columbia) model, TransMilenio, the first to earn
carbon credits. Adapting it in India is not uncomplicated. In Pune the
first phase of brt became functional in 2006 but has been plagued by
problems of enforcement and lane discipline. The situation is somewhat
similar in Delhi, where a part of the 19 km brt corridor—from Ambedkar
Nagar to Delhi Gate—has become functional.

On the ground
Commuters say they are not comfortable crossing three lanes to get to
the bus stop. “This system is confusing. I find it difficult to cross so
many lanes because I am not sure which side the buses and cars are
coming from,” says Rajesh Kumari, a pharmacist at Batra Hospital who
daily takes the brt corridor for work. Rakhi Mallik, a domestic help,
agrees that getting to the bus stop is a problem, though she says the
bus trip is now faster. The bus stops were placed just before traffic
lights because buses anyway have to stop for traffic lights (see box:
Left, right). This way they don’t stop multiple times.

People have no lane discipline. Even as this reporter was talking to one
of the marshals regulating traffic a man parked his scooter right in
front of the marshal, Ajay Kumar Singh, to get some water. When the
marshal admonished him, his answer, as he hurried away, was that it was
just for a minute. The marshal shrugs, “There is nothing I can do.” The
marshals have no power to book anyone. At times they get abused by
people for enforcing lane discipline.

Motorcyclists and car users say brt has made traffic snarls longer.
Some, however, feel it is good to move buses out of the regular traffic.
Pradeep Kumar Yadav, who has been driving an autorickshaw for the past
two years, says brt is a good idea. “I don’t agree jams have become
worse. The traffic flow is better and it is nice not to have to deal
with buses,” he says. But sitting in her chauffeured, air-conditioned
Innova, Vineet Bammi is irate. “The idea is terrible. It takes forever
to travel down this stretch of road,” she says.

Those who commute by bus are happy that the ride down the brt stretch
has become smooth and fast—some passengers cheekily wave at the cars as
they pass by—but point out that it can do with some improvements. In the
heat, they have to walk to the nearest traffic light to get to the bus
stop. It is a furnace under the steel bus shelter and there are no seats
in it, points out a commuter. “The buses don’t stop exactly in front of
the break in the railings at the bus stop. So people have to squeeze
themselves between the railings and the bus. It is dangerous,” says a
passenger as he boards a bus.

These problems will be fixed, promises the Delhi Integrated Multi-Modal
Transit System (dimts), which is in charge of the project. S Sahai,
managing director, dimts, says, “We are aware of the problems. I agree
the shelters are pathetic. We will change them.”

Shopkeepers along the brt corridor are not excited either because
parking is not allowed on the corridor. This, they think, will affect
their business. “Parking is a problem for my customers. They end up
parking on the pavement,” says Himanshu Bansal, a stationery shop owner.


People need time to learn the system, says Nathu Lal, a conductor with
the Delhi Transport Corporation deputed to regulate buses and commuters
at the Pushp Vihar bus stop. As he herds pedestrians towards the
pavement leading to the bus stop he says, “Look at these people. There
is a perfectly good pavement but they insist on walking in the bus
lane.” He then moves away to scold a young man trying to slip between
the bus and the railing. Alam, an engineer, both explains and
demonstrates the problem. “People don’t follow the law. Bikes go on bus
lanes, pedestrians cross at will. I think the brt concept is good but
people need lane discipline,” he says without a hint of consciousness,
riding a motorcycle in the bicycle lane. 




---------- BOX:Left, right ----------




 If there are many left turns on a road, then a bus lane on the extreme
left will hamper other traffic turning left or turning into traffic. It
also means that every time the bus has to stop for traffic lights, it
tempts passengers to board or disembark at risky areas. Also a curb side
bus lane is used for parking by autos, two-wheelers, thus, forcing buses
to stop in the middle of the road. So the bus lane is placed in the
centre. “The design makes it safer to alight and board a bus from a bus
stop in the centre than play dodge with vehicles on the road,” explains
Geetam Tiwari of tripp who is one of the minds behind the corridor’s
design. 





---------- BOX:Safe ride ----------




 Cyclists rarely figure in debates on traffic but if you take the BRT
corridor early morning it will be difficult to miss hundreds of
commuters pedalling to work on the bicycle lane. On average 8,326 cycles
and 1,023 rickshaws use the corridor. They are the biggest beneficiaries
of BRT, for they are the most vulnerable on roads. “Any day it is better
to have a cycle track,” says Mahesh Kumar, a daily wager, adding, “but
you feel like killing bikers who invade the bicycle lane.” Paved track
also keep tracks dirt-free. 





---------- Caravan to disaster ----------





Growth in personal vehicles is unsustainable and the cost of congestion
too high

Roads in urban India are creaking under the weight of the growing number
of vehicles—personal vehicles, to be precise. Population growth means
more people to buy cars and motorcycles; economic growth means more
people can buy; and urbanization means more people will buy vehicles. In
short, a crisis is at hand. In the developing world, vehicle ownership
is growing much faster than the population. In Delhi, for example, the
rate of registration of vehicles per day has doubled between 2000 and
2006.

By 2010, urban India’s population is expected to reach 410 million from
300 million in 2000, which means more cars and motorcycles will be
unleashed on the already vehicle-choked roads.  The number of cars in
Delhi alone has gone up from 0.7 million in 1997 to 1.6 million in 2007.
Infrastructure is just not keeping pace with vehicle growth.Between 1996
and 2006, road length in Delhi increased by 20 per cent, while the
number of cars increased by 132 per cent.

Congestion is eased temporarily when roads are widened or flyovers built
but as more vehicles are added every day, this space is quickly
overtaken and the situation is back to square one. In fact, it is
getting worse. In 2001, the road length per vehicle in Delhi was 8.5 km.
This has come down to 6 km per vehicle in 2007. So the driving space is
actually decreasing. This leads to congestion, slow traffic movement and
pollution. Indian cities are already facing this reality; congestion is
becoming a routine part of life and air pollution is on the rise.

Misplaced priority
The present situation could have been averted had public transport not
been neglected. Public transport services have worsened in terms of
comfort, frequency and coverage, hence people are switching to private
transport. “We care only about ourselves and forget about the greater
public good. No one cares about marginalized groups such as pedestrians
and bus commuters,” says Rakesh Mehta, chief secretary, Delhi. Economic
growth and liberalization policies have exacerbated this trend by making
it easier and cheaper to buy cars.

Taxes are slashed to please car manufacturers and the upper and the
middle class. The road tax buses pay every year is more than the
one-time road tax cars and two-wheelers pay. This year the government
further reduced the excise duty on cars. Cars also get privileges in
terms of cheap parking.

Buses, the most efficient mode of transport, did not get priority
despite the fact that they transport more people than cars and
motorcycles. In Delhi, personal vehicles represent 94 per cent of total
vehicles, but meet only 30 per cent of the travel demand. Since buses
transport more people, their per person fuel efficiency is better. Cars
consume six times more energy than buses, and two-wheelers, 2.5 times
the energy. In terms of road space per person too buses have the upper
hand. To move the same number of people, cars occupy 38 times the road
space than a bus, and two-wheelers occupy 54 times the space. But where
is space? Endless increase in road length is impossible.

Vicious cycle
With the ever increasing number of private vehicles, the clamour to deal
with congestion has become louder. The traditional response to
congestion has been to widen roads, build flyovers and elevated roads.
Every Indian city is on a flyover building spree. Under the 9th and 10th
Five Year Plans, over a thousand crore rupees were set aside for bridges
and flyovers.

It is now recognized world over that more roads and flyovers are not the
solution. It leads to a vicious cycle: traffic increases leading to
congestion, so roads are widened and that in turn encourages more
vehicles to be introduced onto the roads. For every 10 per cent increase
in road length, a 9 per cent increase in traffic is seen, estimates
Sierra Club, an American environmental organization.

Cost of congestion
Small wonder Indian cities never have enough roads. With every
additional vehicle, there is more congestion and emissions. Congestion
also runs up the fuel bill. A 1997 study by the Petroleum Conservation
Research Association, Delhi, showed that idling vehicles in the city
wasted 321,432 litres of petrol and 101,312 litres of diesel every day.
At current fuel rates, this costs Rs 1.84 crore a day, enough to build
the first brt corridor in Delhi in seven months at Rs 20 crore a km.
According to the Central Institute of Road Transport, Pune, congestion
costs India Rs 3,000-4,000 crore a year. In Bangkok congestion shaves 6
per cent off its economic production. 

Traffic jams cost time as well. The 2007 Urban Mobility Report of the
Texas Transportation Institute, us, estimates that congestion made urban
Americans travel 4.2 billion hours more and spend an extra 11 billion
litres of petrol at the cost of us $78 billion in a year. This is more
than 100 times the extra aid the World Food Programme has sought to tide
over the global food crisis. 

Slow moving vehicles pollute more. At 75 km per hour, an automobile
emits 6.4 g of carbon monoxide per km. But at 10 km per hour, the peak
hour speed in Delhi, a car spews 33 g of carbon monoxide per km. Peak
hour speed in Kolkata is 7 km per hour, a bit like slow cycling. Even a
5 per cent reduction in traffic will increase vehicle speed by at least
10 per cent.

The health cost-respiratory and cardiac problems-is immense. The
introduction of congestion tax in London in 2003 has improved the health
of its people. The tax is levied on private vehicles entering central
London during working hours. A study published in the journal,
Occupational and Environmental Medicine, this year stated that due to
reduced pollution, 1,888 lives are saved each year in London. 

There is yet another cost. Road accidents in India cost the country 1
per cent of its gross national product, according to the Central
Institute of Road Transport. Cutting these costs, clearly, requires
putting a brake on car growth. 





---------- BOX:Traffic stress ----------




 A study on stress levels among bus drivers in Los Angeles shows
association between exposure to peak traffic conditions and on-the-job
elevations of urinary catecholamines, stress-related hormones. Traffic
congestion lowers perceived control, which in turn can result in stress.
Journal of Applied Psychology, 1991

Persons reporting traffic stress had lower health status and more
depressive symptoms among urban populations, according to a US study.
Social Science Medicine, 2004 

A survey in Britain, Finland and the Netherlands to identify factors
provoking motorists to behave aggressively shows that traffic density
may have a role. Seventy-four per cent respondents said they would get
angry on losing the parking spot they had been eyeing.
Accident Analysis and Prevention, 2002

A US study found traffic congestion, road construction and lack of
parking space as sources of stress for drivers.
Perceptual and Motor Skills, 2000

The European Community Respiratory Health Survey II conducted during
1999-2001 in 12 countries showed that annoyance due to air pollution
could be used to classify air quality. Forty-three per cent participants
reported moderate annoyance and 14 per cent, high annoyance.
International Journal of Epidemiology, 2007





---------- Can’t miss the bus ----------





Public transport is the only answer to congestion and pollution

The present crisis demands new solutions. And the solution is public
transport, for space to accommodate cars is limited and cleaner and
fuel-efficient technologies defeated by the number of vehicles. The
Delhi government is planning to have 120 km of metro, 292 km of brt, and
50 km each of monorail and light rail by 2020. These will be
interconnected. “We need different modes of transport. In the Walled
City, for instance, metro or brt will not work because the roads are not
wide enough. There we are going for the light rail system,” says Rakesh
Mehta, chief secretary, Delhi.

brt is cheaper and quicker to construct as compared to metro.  Metro
costs Rs 100-300 crore per kilometre, while brt costs Rs 10-20 crore.
“While Bangalore metro is scheduled to roll out in 2011, I expect it to
be ready only by 2015. Its intended coverage is inadequate,” says G V
Dasarathi, director of applications, Cadem Technologies, member of a
network of citizens promoting public transport in Bangalore, Greener
Bangalore. The Delhi metro has, however, inspired other cities. The
Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (dmrc) has carried out a feasibility study
for a Chennai metro. Ahmedabad and Hyderabad are also developing a metro
system. But Kolkata and Delhi metros have not met the projected
ridership. The Kolkata metro was to carry about 1.7 million passengers
per day but its ridership is only 0.2-0.3 million.

Integrating different public transport systems is crucial to their
optimal utilization. “We found that only people who live or work near
metro stations and those who had cars and could park them were using the
metro. We have 100 feeder buses and are going to get 300 more,” says
Anuj Dayal, public relations officer, dmrc. “brt acting as a feeder to
metro is a good thing. Metro can’t reach everywhere and there is enough
demand in Delhi for the two systems.”

Meeting this demand will require massive investment. But the benefits of
public transport if properly counted—health and energy and space
efficiency—will make it worthwhile. Enhancing energy and emission
efficiency will need a younger bus fleet and special provisions like a
dedicated bus lane.

Money factor
One challenge with public transport is meeting its operational cost.
Revenues come mainly from fares and advertisements, but fares have to be
kept low to ensure that more people travel by bus. A few countries levy
taxes on cars which are channelled into developing public transport.
France asks employers with more than nine employees to pay a transport
tax that contributes to public transport operation. “Such a tax could be
introduced in India,” says S K Lohia, director, urban transport, urban
development ministry.

London levies a congestion tax on cars to drive into central London. It
has now proposed linking the tax to emission levels. This discourages
use of personal vehicles. Other possible sources of finance could be
differential parking fees for private vehicles during peak and non-peak
hours. Parking fares could also be varied depending on the locality and
duration of space use. San Francisco, Belgrade and Bogota are some
cities with such methods of parking pricing. 

Carbon credits
Until recently public transport systems were not considered for the
clean development mechanism (cdm). The brt system in Bogota,
TransMilenio, is the only public transport system registered for cdm
with the un Framework Convention on Climate Change. This makes it earn
carbon credits. A new methodology for evaluating brt systems had to be
developed when TransMilenio applied for cdm. Emission reductions are
calculated taking into consideration upgrade of bus fleet, increased bus
capacity, development of infrastructure for better bus operation and
incentives for commuters to switch from cars to public transport.
TransMilenio’s estimated revenue from cdm between 2006 and 2012 is us $
20 million for reducing greenhouse gases by 1.7 million tonnes. 





---------- BOX:BRT users ----------




 The city of Bogota, Columbia, is famous for its BRT project. This is
one of the first successful BRT models, and the Delhi BRT is based on
it. The BRT system in Bogota, TransMilenio, carries over 1,050,000
passengers daily. The first phase of the system became operational in
2000 and is more than 60 km long. TransMilenio is the only public
transport system earning carbon credits.

TransMilenio was based on the BRT system in Curitiba, Brazil. Curitiba’s
BRT started in the 1960s. Of the 2.7 million people in Curitiba, 1.9
million use BRT. With 70 per cent of commuters using the system
Curitiba’s use of the public transport system is the highest of all
Brazilian state capitals. As a result, the city’s fuel consumption is 30
per cent lower than in comparable Brazilian cities. 

Today the BRT system is being used in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago,
Boston, Sydney, Adelaide, Quito (Ecuador) and Leeds (UK).Several other
cities are planning to implement the BRT concept.

In India, BRT projects are to come up in Ahmedabad, Bhopal, Indore,
Jaipur, Pune, Rajkot, Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada and Bangalore. Unlike
Delhi, most of these projects are being funded by the central government
under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission. 





---------- Act fast ----------





 The BRT concept cannot be abandoned

The clock is ticking fast. Roads in Indian cities are getting saturated
by vehicles. There is no option but to build a public transport system
efficient and attractive enough to replace cars. Therefore, the brt
concept cannot be abandoned; it must be improved to make it work. The
Delhi government has a few plans like coordinating signals. They will be
automated and the signal length will vary during peak and non-peak
traffic hours. As for accusations of lack of coordination and
cooperation between agencies, the government says the mistake will not
be repeated in the next stretch of the brt corridor. The Delhi
Integrated Multi-Modal Transit System will be in charge of the corridor.
“So many cities in the country are setting up brt that we can’t get the
buses as soon as we would like to.The companies, Tata and Ashok Leyland,
are getting inundated with orders,” says the Delhi chief secretary.

The success of the Delhi brt cannot be judged in a few weeks. It will
take time and discipline. One measure will be whether the number of
private vehicles on the road reduces. And that won’t happen until
various public transit systems are interconnected and parking facilities
created for car users, so that they can take the bus. Making public
transport score over cars in terms of comfort, speed, accessibility,
cost and convenience is a tall order but not impossible. Giving buses a
right of way is in everybody’s interest; it frees space for cars, for in
unsegregated traffic buses block two lanes.

Urban India has no choice but to board the bus. 



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