Traffic congestion has become an arising major issue in our country. According to the TomTom traffic index report, cities like Mumbai, Bengaluru & Delhi are in the list of world’s top 10 most chocked road. This TomTom traffic index gives insight about traffic congestion across 400 cities around the world. This index data calculates the extra time which driver spends in traffic. For continuous years, our metropolitan cities like Mumbai, Delhi, & Bengaluru always make place in the list of TomTom’s top 10 most congested cities. For your surprise, Mumbai topped this list in 2018 and since, then remained in the top 5. During pandemic, the traffic jams decreased significantly. But, the top 10 countries were still the same: #1.Moscow, #2.Mumbai & Bogota, #6.Bengaluru and #8.Delhi. We are facing the issue of traffic jams for years and solution has never sufficient. Let take an insight at the reasons of traffic congestion.
Increasing number of vehicles- one of the factors that causes traffic jams
When we talk of traffic jams in India then it is also on authority and their planning that impacts traffic congestion. Do you think, if government plan accordingly then this problem can be solved?. Yes, if they give appropriate solution that may decrease traffic congestion. But, our authority always sticks to the traditional solution that is increasing road spaces. According to the planner, one of the reasons of traffic congestion is not having enough road spaces. They are right about this fact but they should also consider there is the increase in number of vehicles over years. The road spaces and infrastructure of India has increment of 30% over the previous decade . In parallel, vehicle has growth about three times. There is big ratio difference in constructions of road spaces and number of vehicles. The authority should take different way rather than traditional one.
Different statistics give us insight that public transport like bus has same capacity as 30-40 cars and a single metro can take 30-40 buses off the road. In India, buses are widely ignored as public transport. The bus rider has faced decline of 20% in metropolitan cities over the decade. Our government should focus on public transport to decrease traffic jams in rush hour. Public should avoid using vehicle to cover small distances.
Urban mobility -role as the reasons of the traffic congestion
When you think about urbanization, then visuals of larger cities, developed technologies and motorization comes to our mind instantly. But when you think logically, then these features lead to more congestion around the cities. You should take a note that urban mobility and congestion take a major role in traffic jams around the country, sometime which solely depends on household behavior.
According to data of surveys about urban mobility and congestion stem shows that mobility is slow in Indian cities even out of the rush hours. The mean travel speed of metropolitan cities is 38.5 km per hour in USA, and it is around 24.4 km per hour in our country. This data gives us understanding that we are driving slower than expected and it may result in congestion in the cities. The data also shows that slowest period in our country is evening is 25% slower than fastest period which is midnight. The driving speed away from the city is faster. Other factors such as weather conditions which includes rain, humidity, heat etc. has also its impact over travel speed and ultimately aid in traffic congestion.
The congestion pattern in India is different from US and UK. The unique travel pattern need standard policy. There should be hard rules and restrictions about travel in our country to improve mobility across the city. This may help little but if Government invests in costly travel spaces and infrastructures. This will be great help in increasing mobility and deduction in congestion across the city.
Also read: Globalization- A threat
Widening population-as antagonist in the story of traffic jams
India is the second most populated country in the world. Increasing population has also increased the demand of transport in India. It has increased around eight times since 1980s. This is the highest in Asia, according to Boston consulting group. In metropolitan cities, public transport has been increasing but still cannot cope with the congestion situation.
The major reason of traffic congestion is that most of the people prefer private vehicles. It is not always on authority to take charges of everything happening around the city. Sometime, it depends on common people to take their responsibility as good citizen that may help in betterment of situation. People uses their personal vehicle to cover small distance and got stuck in the traffic jams for hours. Guess, who is at the loss. Population is increasing, so the transport vehicle is!. If you act smart and think economically, you are going to save your time and efforts.
Transhumance of rural inhabitants to cities- as one of the causes of congestion
Everyone knows, there are lots of opportunities of works in metropolitan cities. Most of the rural inhabitants migrates to cities because of this factor. Migration has increased population density in the city and ultimately, becomes one of the factor of congestion. Movement of people from rural areas to cities for hunting better opportunities, is a part urbanization. There is one solution to this issue is government should give priority to small cities also. They should provide better opportunities there, so people doesn’t need to leave their hometown. In our country, all of the limelight has been on metropolitan cities always. Government always bring different plans to develop and renovate major cities. Government should give us alternative option by giving equal priority to smaller cities. This may result in decline in the population in big cities, and less congestion.
Bad & pothole-ridden roads: as a factor of traffic congestion
One of the reasons of traffic congestion in cities is bad and pothole roads. Our country has third largest road networks in the world. In 2019, the total number of vehicles was 295.8 million, which shows majority of population owns private vehicles. The reason of bad roads and having potholes is also increasing vehicles and having not enough road spaces in parallel. Bad road slows down the speed of the vehicle and results in traffic jams eventually. One of the reason of bad road is its bad quality and often needs repair. Authority needs to repair road periodically, constructs foot over bridges and regulates unauthorized parking. This may improve the situation in traffic situations.
Lack of parking spaces and footpaths
Parking spaces are not enough in India. Because of lack of parking spaces, people parks their vehicles in front of buildings down to the road. Parking on the edge of the road deduce the area of road and results in congestion. In many places, there are not enough footpath that’s why pedestrians walks on the side of the road and aids in traffic jams.
One of the reasons of traffic congestion is there is not proper implementation of traffic rules.
Traffic congestion doesn’t only cause inconvenience but it is economically draining. The issue of traffic jams can not only solved by constructing enough infrastructures, but can only puzzled out by using different approaches as discussed above. Government should promote public transport and increase taxes on private vehicles. People should follow traffic rules to help in declination of congestion. We should play our role as citizen and sticks to general rules.
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