Lack of mass transit system worrying

Increase of vehicle population may lead to chaos on road by 2014
Wednesday July 21 2004 The New Indian Express

BANGALORE: Bangalore’s roads are bursting at the seams. The already choked roads will, a decade from now, have no space for new vehicles. Thanks to the easy loans and lack of an efficient public transport system, the increase in the vehicle population has been alarming.

Over 700 new vehicles are being registered at five Regional Transport Offices (RTO) in the city everyday. Extrapolate this and it is a staggering 25 lakh vehicles in the next 10 years. Currently, there are 18 lakh vehicles in the city.

The explosion in number of vehicles will not only increase the congestion, but also the pollution levels and accident rate. ‘‘The situation is alarming,’’ transport commissioner I.M. Vittal Murthy told this website’s newspaper.

The Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) is opening a Pandora’s Box by aggressively expanding its fleet by another 1,000 buses.

The result will be chaos on the roads. ‘‘Where is the space for new buses? As it is, the roads are not capable of handling the existing vehicles,’’ gasped one transport department official.

The government, which is focused solely on increasing its revenues from the registration of vehicles, is yet to take a serious note of the situation. The Congress-JD (S) government’s first budget presented on Monday has increased lifetime tax on vehicles, but said nothing about improving public transport.

‘‘Absence of an efficient public transport is the reason behind increase in vehicles, specially two-wheelers,’’ sources said. ‘‘Aggressive marketing strategies adopted by the vehicle manufacturers and attractive loan schemes offered by financial institutions also lure people to buy new vehicles,’’ sources added.

Add to this the delay in execution of the proposed Bangalore Metro Rail project. Touted as the best alternative to private vehicles, this project is expected to clear the clogged roads by offering citizens a faster, cheaper and more comfortable means of city travel.

The short-term measures to decongest roads have failed, as the growth rate is several times higher than the road capacity expansion. New flyovers, grade separators and one-way systems are all short-term decongestion measures.

But for now, there is abundant confusion among government departments, which are yet to take the problem seriously.