Carlin Carr, Mumbai Community Manager
Mumbai is a city of many “mosts,” so it’s not surprising that the superlatives extend to the city’s public transport system. The numbers there, though, are staggering: the city’s two and only rail lines, for example — the Central and Western — carry more than 7.24 million commuters every day. In comparison, the New York City Subway system has 24 rail lines through five boroughs on 656 miles of track and carries an average of 4.8 million passengers each weekday; that’s a mere 60 percent of Mumbai’s 265 miles of lines. In other words, Mumbai’s local trains are the most densely packed trains in the world.
And with slum redevelopment plans that focus on pushing the urban poor to the outskirts, train travel in India’s economic hub will likely become increasingly difficult, not to mention dangerous: an average of 12 people die daily on the Mumbai local’s tracks. Passengers are forced to hang out of open doors or even ride atop the train because of the overwhelming crowds.
While the train network is in desperate need of an upgrade, extension, and additional cars, Mumbai’s municipal corporation has increasingly moved forward with car-focused transport initiatives — a detriment to the majority of commuters as well as to the environment. One of the most prominent and controversial examples of this policy shift is a decade-long project called the Bandra-Worli sealink. The eight-lane bridge, which connects the poshest Mumbai suburbs to a main part of town in seven minutes at a speed limit of 50 kilometers per hour, has left many city residents questioning. The four-kilometer sealink opened in 2010 at a cost to the city of INR 1634 crore — four times more than the initial estimates of INR 400 crore.
A one-way ticket to travel the entire rail line end-to-end costs about $0.30. A one-way fee for the sealink toll is about $1.00, the daily salary of many Mumbai residents.
“Changes in transport policy should emphasize access and equity. They should seek to achieve poverty reduction by decreasing spending on transport and by increasing jobs… They should reduce dependence on fuel (both imported and natural gas), and improve the mobility of the majority,” write Debra Efroymson and Maruf Rahman in a report entitled “Transportation Policy for Poverty Reduction and Social Equity.”
Surprisingly, the city decided last year that it would extend the sealink at a cost of INR 8,800 crore ($1,760 million), further evidence that the infrastructure upgrades are ignoring the needs of the vast majority of Mumbaikers.
A more equitable and environmentally conscious policy could incorporate a Rapid Bus Transit System, which many cities around the world, including Mumbai’s northern neighbor of Ahmedabad, have successfully implemented to reduce traffic woes. In addition to the public systems — the train (work is underway to build a Metro) and buses — the city also needs to take into account the massive fleet of secondary mobility networks; in particular, the autorickshaw. Mumbai is estimated to have 150,000 rickshaws, three-wheeled motorized vehicles that transport passengers who are otherwise left stranded by inadequate and inefficient public transportation systems.
While the auto-rickshaw fills a much-needed gap in the transportation system, the traditional two-stroke engine vehicle is well-known to be highly polluting. Yet solutions to the problem are not as simple as just eliminating the toxic three-wheelers. Passengers, as well as the livelihoods of drivers, rely on the convenience of these vehicles. Therefore, integrating new innovations in rickshaw design — including innovations such as solar-powered vehicles — are essential to a pro-poor and environmentally beneficial policy.
Mumbai’s transport problems are obvious, but the solutions are more nuanced. City officials need to account for the complexity of environmental, social and economic factors in upgrading and expanding mobility in the city. Simply extending bridges, ultimately leading to an increase in cars, is not the most efficient solution. A more equitable and sustainable system and policy needs to underlie decision-making in the city — and, with that, account for the needs of those for whom a whole day’s wages would barely pay for one trip down the sealink.