Curtailing bus services violates the basic right to mobility

It is appalling to read about the recent decision to stop buses going from Delhi towards adjacent Noida in the National Capital Region (NCR) during the evening peak hours — ostensibly to control traffic jams on the Noida-Greater Noida Expressway.

Once again, the common and misplaced refrain is that buses, not cars, cause congestion and buses must get out of the way to free up spaces for cars. The simple math is so incomprehensible to policymakers — buses carrying 60 people can replace at least 30 cars that carry only 1-2 people each!

As there is no clear strategy to meet the mobility needs of the masses with modern and integrated public transport at scale, people are left to organise their own personal transport. And this breeds more permissive measures to protect the privileges of the cars on the road.

This new local decision has restricted long-range passenger buses as well as local buses for commuters within the NCR during evening peak. This has also affected some of the bus routes of the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC).

Bus commuters, who rely on buses the most during evening peak hours to return home like the car-walas, are denied their chosen mode of transport. Public bus service, the responsibility of the state, is being restrained by design.

Barring the preferred mode of the masses when it is needed the most permanently kills the preference for it. This hardens the steady shift towards two-wheelers and cars and induces captive and distress walking and cycling to meet the void.

For those who desperately need buses as the only mode of choice because they cannot afford anything else, this decision is in direct conflict with environmental justice. A report by think tank Centre for Science and Environment in 2018 had shown that nearly a third of Delhi cannot afford the minimum bus fare — think about those who can afford only buses.

What may seem like a local and disjointed decision in Noida reflects an emerging trend in which the buses are quietly restricted on targeted routes, especially during peak hours. Several neighbourhoods of Delhi have fallen victim to such bus route curtailment over time.

Such decisions are taken despite the fact that National Urban Transport Policy seeks roads that prioritise people over vehicles and National Habitat Standards and Transit Orientated Development Policy wants regeneration of urban spaces with improved connectivity to make communities more transit-oriented.

The Commission for Air Quality Management in National Capital Region and Adjoining Areas has also asked for strengthening of public transport connectivity between Delhi and other NCR towns.

While Mission LiFE states, “Use public transport wherever possible,” official policies are transforming neighbourhoods into places “where using public transport is not possible.”

In the face of the growing air pollution and climate crisis, curtailment of bus or public transport services contradicts a landmark judgment from the Supreme Court in April 2024 that expanded the scope of Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution to include “Right against the adverse effects of climate change...” It stated that the rights to health and life are affected by air pollution and climate change and if the government cannot strengthen the adaptation and coping strategies of communities, the right to life can be violated.

Yet, public transport repeatedly falls victim to middle-class disdain. Further, middle-class environmentalism rarely targets putting a brake on auto mobility.

Buses without riders

Delhi is still struggling to meet the Supreme Court-mandated target of 10,000 buses and, along with the larger NCR, it is failing to rejig public transport infrastructure to enable increased ridership.

Buying more buses cannot help if the entire ecosystem is not transformed to enable usage of buses. Despite the ongoing efforts to modernise and electrify buses in Delhi, the public transport ridership has dipped continuously. Even though Delhi government has claimed a recent turnaround in the ridership numbers, bus ridership has recorded a sharp drop of 48.5 per cent since 2017-18, even though the bus fleet increased from 5,695 in 2017-18 to 7,072 in 2021-22, as per the Economic Survey of 2022-23.

Slow and erratic buses caught in congestion lose attraction. Moreover, our assessment of the arrival and departure schedule in each bus stop shows that less than one per cent of the bus stops have a less than 10-minute waiting time and 50 per cent bus stops have a higher waiting time (more than 15 minutes).

Looming mobility crisis

The fact that the capital region is in a grip of explosive vehicle numbers does not surprise or shock anyone anymore. But try to understand the numbers differently.  

The current level of Delhi’s population and its travel needs are generating a humongous 154 million motorised passenger kilometres daily. How these kilometres will be travelled will decide the fate of this city.

While about 23 per cent of these kilometres are run by buses and 27 per cent by metro, imagine the implications if more users of buses and metro slip back to personal transport due to lack of integration, increased journey cost of interchanges and poor accessibility to public transport.

Despite this reality, engineering choices for road building remain pro-car, promoting impossibly wide roads with multi-lanes and grade separators, shrinking pedestrian spaces, foot over-bridges and a lack of safe at grade crossings, thus increasing the degree of difficulty in accessing destinations or public transport nodes.

There is no policy courage to make buses and metros a convenient choice by pricing the personal vehicle usage higher, putting parking brakes, and building infrastructure and spaces for public transport.

This dilemma of the Delhi-NCR only mirrors the national crisis. Even as the central government is setting aside more funds for more metros and more electric buses, it needs to push for bolder decisions to reduce personal vehicle usage.

If public policy continues to prioritise the convenience of cars, the clean air and climate action plans demanding higher modal share for public transport will not work.