Bhubaneswar Has More Vehicles Than People

Bhubaneswar: The number of registered vehicles in Bhubaneswar have outnumbered the city’s population. This has prompted the odisha government to start working on a low-carbon mobility plan for the Smart City.

Housing & urban development department and Bhubaneswar Development Authority (BDA) are working in tandem with German development agency Deutsche Gesellschaftfür Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH to develop a Low-Carbon Mobility Plan (LCMP) for the city, a report in the Business Standard stated.

The population of the capital city is one million while the number of registered vehicles here is 1.4 million. This data shows a high dependence on private vehicles.

The LCMP is looking at provisions for reliable, affordable, safe and efficient transportation systems for the city. The plan intends to optimize public transport, cycling, pedestrian infrastructure, and shared mobility options.

The LCMP will be updated every 5 years from 2019 to 2040. The plan will align with Smart City Mission of Bhubaneswar

“LCMP is a strategic vision document taken up by BDA with support from GIZ to guide the city’s mobility in a low carbon sustainable manner for the next 20 years. Considering this, LCMP becomes an important input to the Comprehensive Development Plan (CDP) of Bhubaneswar which is also a long-term (15-20 years) visioning and planning document,” BDA Vice Chairman Prem Chandra Chaudhary told the national daily.

The plan will be drafted after a working group of representatives from various key agencies like Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC), Bhubaneswar Smart City Ltd (BSCL), Capital Region Urban Transport (CRUT), Bhubaneswar Urban Knowledge Centre (BUKC) and Public Works Department is formed.