It’s been four months that the Car-free Day launched in Cyberabad that has really become a national topic. City’s Car-Free-Day initiative has quickly scaled up to Gurgaon, Delhi and Karnal. Car-Free-Day is a trending topic on social media, transport and civil circles, thanks to the Delhi Government’s decision of considering the even and odd number cars on alternate days. The Car Free Day was currently being observed in four locations (Hyderabad, Gurgaon, Delhi, Karnal) and now many other cities are considering to follow.
When it comes to Cyberabad, the first phase has focused extensively on building awareness and enlisting volunteers. In addition to the traffic junction activities/corporate outreach, a sub-campaign ‘one lakh hands’ has been initiated, which is working on sensitizing motor-vehicle users by way of letters from one-lakh school children.
Now the discussions are on to introducing an effective Public/Private mechanism in place to sustain the movement. Today C.V. Anand, IPS, Commissioner of Police, Cyberabad, has joined the Car Free Thursday team to give more push to the campaign. He along with 200 plus Industry leaders, volunteers and school students have cycled from Cyient Circle to (near Raheja Mindspace) Cyberabad Commissioner’s office where he has addressed the media.
Sharing his views on the campaign, the Police Commissioner said, “It is concerning to see the number of growing vehicles on daily basis leading to major traffic jams and pollution. If this continues, the situation will be out of control, as we do not have the mechanism to handle it. Therefore, the campaigns like Car Free Thursday will be able to make people to use more public transportation, cycle to work or walk. We will be supporting this campaign by introducing makeshift cycle lanes (from IIIT junction till Wipro to start with). Besides, we will also sensitize corporate companies take this up in a big way and encourage employees for carpooling, cycling, walking and so on”.
Ramesh Loganathan, president of HYSEA, who also joined the ride with Anand said, “We were successful in building awareness among the citizens. Till date, we could run this program with the help of volunteers. Now, we are planning to get a dedicated team in addition to the volunteers at least for one year”, Loganathan said.
“Over the past one year, SCSC has been very active on working on road safety issues by way of putting in more surveillance systems in place, enlisting many traffic volunteers to work along with the traffic police to manage traffic and also by way of running SHE shuttles to facilitate travel of women employees. We are very happy for the Cyberabad Commissioner of Police himself joining the cycle ride today and providing leadership for the Car Free Thursday campaign. This will certainly motivate many others to join this movement” said Bharani Aroll, secretary SCSC.
Vishala, the founder-director of Identcity, who conceptualized the Car Free Thursday campaign said “the outreach on CFT is very grass-root and the focus is on bringing behavioral change for the long-term. Our One-Lakh Hands initiative of involving kids has also started giving results and few of parents have reached out to us saying they will adopt this from now on. “
“Traffic problem can be solved only if people choose more space-efficient travel. Traveling by bus is 18 – 20 times more space efficient than traveling by car. For those who feel buses are very inconvenient, they should at least carpool. 5 people traveling together in a care is equal to eliminating 4 other private vehicles” said Prashanth Bachu an Urban Transport specialist who is part of the Car Free Thursday team.
The campaign has been driven by HYSEA & SCSC in association with TSIIC, RTC, Cyberabad Police. IdentCITY has conceptualized it. WRI India(previously EMBARQ) as a knowledge partner. Partners include Ascendas, Cykul, Zify, ACT Carpool, Commut, Raastha Studios, Extent IT solutions, Sride, Polaris and other IT companies. (NSS)
Now Cyberabad CP plans cycle lanes in hitec city
