I heard some shocking official numbers. Bangalore's vehicular population is growing at 10%. I'll tell you what that means. Look at all the traffic around you. In 2016 you'll have double that. Take a good look at all the rain trees. They'll make way for broader roads. Worse, they will be replaced by the token Bougainvillea shrubs that the BBMP plants to maintain the statistics.
The trouble is I still don't see any measures to disincentivize private cars. Road taxes should be raised. Cribbers should be taxed again. There should be a special punishment for all ex-NRIs who drive alone in their Toyota Innovas that are substituting for the Honda Odysseys that they left behind in New Jersey. There should be ridiculous charges for parking anywhere in the city; even at office. Do something. Do ANYTHING. Save my city.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
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4 comments:
I see the kind of anger and pain you have. Let me tell you taxing hefty or increasing parking will not help. All we need is the common sense to use the public transport.
Having said that, I certainly want officials to collect hefty fines for driving alone or less than 50% of the max permitted capacity in city limits for private vehicles. But I don't see this implementable till Namma-Metro is completely operational.
Follow the SG model:
1. Have good public transport including lots of A/C buses at higher ticket fares
2. Have a usable Taxi/Auto system (without this the public transport will fail) where the driver will actually take you where you want to go and not where he wants to go.
3. Start Taxing - from the purchase of the car (Yes, SG's authorities how many cars can be bought in a quarter and you bid for those slots)
4. Tax the use of good roads (use a flexible Electronic Road Pricing rather than the flat price - allows you to charge as congestion goes up)
5. Tax parking (its even taxed in neighborhood HDB estates)
And then see a city with much better traffic.
Depps: I know I am repeating what we have discussed in person a 100 times, but I am writing it here for the benefit of your readers. :-)
unless there is a viable alternative, increasing taxes and penalising car owners will not solve the problem. it is appalling how bad we are with public transport in our urban areas considering their size and densities.
at the risk of being tagged as a 'snobbish' NRI again, I will say, I experience cities like Berlin, Munich, they have 2 layers of underground metro running...for a population that is not comparable to our big cities.
Everytime I am riding one of these metros I wonder, what is it that is stopping our Indian cities to have even a fraction of such infrastructure??
none of these problems can be solved by slapping on fines etc unless there is no proper alternative presented to people.
Whoa! The replies are longer than the post. That means only one thing. My response will be a new post
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