What should the urban development agenda of the new government be? Very few countries of the world have become developed and reached a per capita income of $10,000 without at least becoming 60 per cent urban.
Where are Indian cities placed? Taking a global perspective of our cities, we note that they are like cities in the US in terms of mobility: Public transport is more a feature of large cities both in India and the US, when compared with smaller cities in both the countries where mobility is increasingly driven by own private vehicles. Based on a survey (https://www.statista.com/
forecasts/1348453/most-
common-modes-of-
transportation-for-
commuting-in-india), as of March 2024, nearly 43 per cent of respondents reporting using their own car in the first place, followed by those owning a motor bicycle at the second place (34 per cent), and only 31 per cent of Indian commuters reportedly used public transport, ranking it in the third place after cars and motor bicycles.
Mobility issues
For comparison, in the US, the proportion of commuters using public transport accounted for a meagre 5 per cent as of 2019, based on the American Community Survey (ACS). Per a Eurobarometer survey, 49 per cent of people in larger cities of the European Union cities used public transit to commute to work, while in the case of some cities like Vienna, nearly 74 per cent of commuters used public transit. So we find Indian commuters between those in the US and Europe in their use of public transport.
The new government should consider the peculiar features of Indian cities while devising policies. While Indian cities like Bengaluru are projected to have a per capita GDP of nearly $12,600 by 2030, as per McKinsey (2010), Bengaluru and Pune are designated among the sixth and seventh most congested cities in the world, in terms of their vehicular traffic.
The average Indian city’s per capita income is about ₹63,945 (about $800), based on data from the Global Human Settlements Layer.
So paradoxically enough, poverty is also relatively more urbanised in India now with steadily increasing urbanisation. For several reasons, urban poverty is more challenging than rural poverty because of social exclusion, food insecurity, environmental challenges and housing unaffordability.
We do not yet have estimates of urban poverty which are significant for their effects on the use of public transport. Given our cities’ income, it would benefit a significantly high proportion of our urban poor and the middle class to have access to public transport.
There is evidence that the existence of public transport ensures unconditional access to jobs, which is important for ensuring growth with jobs.
The evidence from Hurricane Sandy, based on recent research, is that when it cut off parts of New York City from public transit, it affected severely prospects of workers who were looking for jobs. We need to make the various parts of our sprawling cities accessible to the poor and middle class via public transport.
Mixed zoning
To encourage proximity of residence and workplaces and minimal time spent commuting, mixed use zoning with multiple land uses would be conducive, even while cities in the US typically use low density residential zoning.
Indian cities are also organic, with many informal settlements and little planning. So master planning exercises, which currently span over a few years, must be completed in minimal time and not be very detailed. Indian cities are also unique in their strong land use regulations such as floor area ratio.
The new government can carry forward the agenda of public transport for growth with jobs, appropriate land use regulations and mixed use zoning for cities.
The writer is professor, Institute for Social and Economic Change, and a visiting Honorary Fellow, Stanford University’s Center for South Asia.