Stakeholders of the proposed Urban Metropolitan Transportation Authority (UMTA) for the city expressed their suggestions and concerns about the authority at a meeting that was held here on Friday.
The authority has been mooted to integrate different modes of transport – metro, road, waterway and railway — and improve their quality of service. The aim is to enable commuters to choose from different modes of sustainable and passenger-friendly transport.
The UMTA chairman Elias George, who is also the managing director of Kochi Metro Rail Limited (KMRL), said representatives of the district administration, Kochi Corporation, Motor Vehicles Department and National Transportation Planning and Research Centre (NATPAC) discussed proposals in the draft document on the UMTA that would shortly be sent to the State government for ratification.
NATPAC director B.G. Sreedevi said the draft was a comprehensive and well-written one. “We suggested a few modifications so that it could become a legislation, without hindrances and possible objections from stakeholder departments,” she said.
The draft document is expected to become law in over a year, thus bringing different commuting modes under the authority. This is a prerequisite for getting funds from the Union Ministry of Urban Development.
Ernakulam Regional Transport Officer (RTO) B. J. Antony, who represented the Motor Vehicles Department, said the State government could enable speedy constitution of the UMTA by framing suitable laws to prevent possible clashes with provisions of the Central Motor Vehicles’ Act.
For example, the Central Act had liberalised bus permits in the late 1980s to enable bus owners to operate in routes where there is demand for public transport. But this resulted in inadequate public transport in other routes, following which people had to depend on private vehicles.
In Kochi, most bus operators and even the Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) still prefer the conventional and lucrative Aluva/Kakkanad-Fort Kochi route, letting down passengers in other routes.
Representatives of various agencies also spoke of how UMTA would be vested with a few powers now enjoyed by the Regional Transport Authority and the corporation. Under UMTA, traffic police too will have a say in ensuring optimal use of public transport so that there is less number of private vehicles on the road.
Once UMTA law is readied, funds will be earmarked for introducing feeder buses from metro stations, modernising boats and jetties, widening narrow junctions and corridors in the city and immediate suburbs.
