Delhi government’s unique experiment to introduce odd-even formula to curb the rising air pollution appears to have struck a chord with the administration in Ahmedabad.
Authorities in the business capital of Gujarat have begun considering options to implement similar measures to reduce the air pollution.
Leading the plan is the Ahmedabad Municipal Commissioner, D Thara, who wants to ‘move in’ with the plan with swiftness to ensure that the pollution level in the city doesn’t reach as dangerous level as it had in the national capital.
She told www.jantakareporter.com, “Of course pollution in Ahmedabad has not reached as dangerously high as it was in Delhi. But we don’t want to wait until we too are faced with same desperate situation. Keeping that in mind, we’ve begun the consultation process to come up with a plan similar to Delhi’s.”
Among the options being considered by Thara are keeping 20 percent vehicles off the road, decongesting city roads by removing illegal parking of cars and creating awareness on the better behaviour of drivers.
She said, “We will also focus on giving push to public transport augmentation. Ahmedabad is a comprehensive city unlike Delhi, which is very vast. Our public transport connectivity has been relatively better, but we need to make it even better.
“However, we realise that all our steps will be pointless if we don’t make the drivers behave well. Therefore, we will be focussing on creating plenty of awareness to ensure that the drivers follow traffic rules.”
There’s no realistic timeline for Ahmedabad’s odd-even plan to kick in, but the AMC commissioner said that it could be a reality within 3-6 months time.
The local administration has already started a crackdown on removing the illegal parking areas from the city.
Ahmedabad has more than 34 lakh registered vehicles with more than 10 lakh vehicles being registered in the last five year alone.
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