Assessing public transport performance using level of services

Abstract

As any city develops and grows, the demand for transport is also increases and so is the need for sustainable modes becomes more evident. Public bus transport plays a vital role in leading the city’s growth and development positively or in some cases negatively as well. Bhopal, being the capital district of the state is facing a fast rate of urban development and industrialization. Over the last decadal population growth was about 3.5%, quite higher than the national average of 2% (Mehta & Associates, Indore, 2005). Currently Bhopal’s public transport consists of buses and mini buses. Public Transport, although present, caters to only a small fraction of person trips in Bhopal and needs to be strengthened in order to check the enormous growth of personalized vehicles. The introductions of Bus Rapid Transit System (BRTS) in 2013 also need to be evaluated as to seek how it is performing in the city. The growing challenges of the urban sector in Bhopal requires a system which can measure the performance of urban transport activities and also address the performance monitoring for internal decision making.The prime focus of my study is to create an environment of development that will benefits all the user within the city and also to provides an adequate and appropriate public transport services that is convenience and suitable to every section of the society. The study evaluates and assesses the existing public transport system for Bhopal city. It also gave attention to the spatial aspect of the service capacity available and needed for the city. In this evaluation technique, parameters are classified under separate categories of Public Bus transport system are taken and defining them separately to a Level of Service scale so as to identify the issues related to each separately. A public bus transport system benchmarking is necessary to ensure a long term sustainability of the Public transport and also it is important to classify the Key parameters indicators under separate categories with respect to the different cities. It should be necessary that a basic minimum standard set of performance benchmarks shall be present for every public and para-transit transport options for a city and those should be commonly understood and used by all stakeholders.