Public Transport: A necessity or just a government gimmick?
Human population is ever expanding across the globe and density of cities is on the rise as well. The amount of commute is not going down and people are always looking to step out of their homes to buy daily needs, shopping, tourism or just spending a day out in the open. The increased purchasing power has often led to people buying personal vehicles to commute or travel from source to destination. This includes travelling even for minuscule tasks like fetching grocery or visiting a park. This, in turn, has resulted in congestion, energy crisis and disgruntlement on the roads among the commuters.
For long, governments across the world have invested the taxpayer’s money in enabling public transport to ease the lives of daily commuters. Public transport requires heavy investment on infrastructure and technology to ensure it runs without hiccups and governments often keep that as an agenda for their voters during elections. In some places around the world, this can be a political gimmick with no improvement in public infrastructure, while in other countries this comes as a god sent gift for the public. Two very contrasting places for utility of public transport as a necessity can be seen from below.
India
Demography: A vast expanse of land with high density of population in metro cities. The increased purchasing power and growing economy has enabled a lot of people to have their own means of transport.
Public Transport: Multiple modes of public transport are present, but they are hugely uncomfortable. Introduction of metros has made lives easier only for people in New Delhi. Other metro cities are still reeling under extensive and endless construction that is required to enable metros. Governments have promised to make lives simpler for the commuters, but they end up focusing their energies on other priorities leading to delays.
Verdict: Public Transport promises are a government gimmick in India despite being a hard-pressed necessity for everyone
Europe/Singapore
Demography: There is a vast expanse of land, but density of population is not too high. People often own private vehicles as well but do not use them for every single task unless it is necessary.
Public transport: There is a wide network of public transport that has been established in these regions owing to diligent investments by the government into public transport infrastructure and technology. There are trams, metros, subway and over the road trains which are travelling to almost every corner of the cities. In addition, the cost of travel significantly reduces as compared to driving in your own vehicle making the public transport very enticing. The cleanliness and safety encourage more and more people to adopt this as they respect their time and money.
Verdict: Public transport is a necessity and has been taken seriously by the government to ease the life of its citizens
Public transport is a grave necessity across the world, and it is imperative that with the push for carbon zero footprint, the public embrace the public transport whenever available, and the governments focus their priorities on setting up top notch public transport for its citizens so that their gimmick gets translated into a promise. High density cities can largely benefit from an effective public transport system which is affordable for the public as well.
Time is money and ultimately economy will grow if the common people have more time to invest in themselves instead of slogging out their hours of the day in traffic navigating the congested roads.
