Blue skies and brown earth

It has taken a virus, the lowest among species, to teach us that a sustainable transport system can and must be developed

Covid-19 has brought almost the entire world and all forms of transport to a screeching halt. Even non-motorised transport like walking and cycling have been shut down. Without vehicles and their emissions of criteria pollutants and green-house gases (GHGs), the skies are now blue. Transport has several negative externalities — emissions of GHG and criteria pollutants, increasing dependence on fossil fuel threatening a country’s energy security, congestion, road-related morbidity and mortality etc. These problems have been quantified and measures to mitigate them have been extensively discussed. But seldom has transport itself become a negative externality as a potential transmitter of disease and completely shut down as a mitigation measure to fight a vicious pandemic. 

In the short term, the transport shutdown should be partly relaxed to move migrants back home. The trauma experienced by workers stranded in cities where they have no family, no income, and no shelter will undoubtedly propel them homewards once the lockdown lifts. Crowded buses and trains at that time will destroy any gains made during the lockdown. To avoid this situation, the government should run special trains for them now with social distancing measures, with testing at the point of departure and quarantine at the point of arrival. 

The long-term question is whether humans will go back to their old transport policies and practices or whether the virus will lead them to design, build and operate a more sustainable transport system. 

Long-term lessons 

The 2009 Bellagio Declaration on Transportation and Climate Change introduced the concepts of “Avoid, Shift and Improve” to make transport sustainable. We have since taken ad hoc measures to reduce transport demand. For example, when Delhi was highly polluted, the government introduced the odd-even scheme to reduce transport emissions, but did not implement this or other measures wholeheartedly. 

 

 

There are some 10 million personal vehicles registered in Delhi, of which some 7 million are two-wheelers; only about 3 million are cars. All that the scheme aimed at was to halve the number of cars to reduce pollution, leaving the two-wheelers on the roads. As a result, the reduction in PM 2.5, according to TERI’s source apportionment studies, was only around 4-6 per cent, whereas the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) reports that the reduction on account of the Janata Curfew on March 22 was 51 per cent compared to a day earlier. We have now lived the lockdown without even stepping out of our homes: no cars, no two-wheelers, not even bicycles. We have worked from home, attended meetings virtually, children have had classes online, and we have even had virtual marriages. The technology to enable us to work avoiding motorised transport is now available and should be used to reduce transport demand. 

Work from home and staggered timings should now be adopted on a long-term basis to be effective. It will, no doubt, call for detailed protocols, accountability measures, necessary interaction between staff and even rethinking the structure of organisations and their skill requirements. Structured discussions between governments, businesses and employees should commence now to make this happen. 
 

The 1980 National Transport Policy Committee report and the 2014 report of the National Transport Development Policy Committee, among others, made a number of recommendations on how to effect a beneficial shift from highly polluting road transport to benign rail transport and even more benign water transport. However, despite a coast line of 7,500 km and inland waterways of 14,500 km, the share of domestic marine transport in India is only 6 per cent compared to 24 per cent in China, according to an ADB study. We fly fuel-intensive jets over short distances to connect Indian cities whereas the UK has stopped short haul flights. What has stopped us is the short-sighted political economy of the industries involved.

When the Motor Vehicles Act was amended in 2019, the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs had recommended that the purchase of a second car should not be permitted unless the buyer could demonstrate a private parking space for it. That was an opportunity we missed. The law should now provide for the local body to levy a parking charge for every car parked on the road, and that will yield a substantial revenue to the government for improvements in the transport sector. 

The automobile industry has responded to the government’s decision to introduce improved Bharat VI (EuroVI equivalent) fuel, making it available a year earlier than required. Despite declaring its intention to populate cities with electric vehicles by 2030, there is no comprehensive policy by the government and no decision on the agency that will lead this endeavour. In any case, using the best fuel available in the city may be a better trade-off than converting everything to electricity. 
 

There is hardly any investment in the institutions required to facilitate transport planning and management in India, unlike China which has major research institutes on transport, populated by doctorates in transport studies. The responsibility for transport is fragmented between governments and within governments in India, enabled by a Constitution that provides for concurrent responsibilities. India is perhaps the only country with six ministries for different modes of transport, making coordinated decision making and implementation of national plans a distant dream. 

It has taken a virus, the lowest among species, to teach us that a sustainable transport system can and must be evolved, based on "avoid, shift and improve" strategies. We should not wait for a virus to strike again to see clear blue skies. 

The author is former secretary, surface transport, government of India and distinguished fellow (Emeritus), TERI