Smart city programme to focus on mobility improvement

AGRA: With the city of Taj all set to receive a make-over as part of the smart city programme of the Union government, the authorities are planning to give prime focus to mobility as a factor of development.
As the city sees a large influx of tourists throughout the year, the authorities have proposed to give importance to improving road transportation facilities and upgradation of traffic management system while developing the smart city.These are aimed at solving the traffic woes and ensuring road safety.
For this, the Agra Municipal Corporation (AMC) has prepared a comprehensive plan to provide convenient public transportation by developing ten different routes across the city. Also, multi-level parking facilities would be developed at nine places.
Municipal Commissioner Indravikram Singh said, “The urban mobility upgradation plan is divided into five major components. They are intelligent bus operations, integrated traffic management system, city surveillance system, mobility card and app and smart parking management system.”
For intelligent bus operation, features like vehicle tracking system, vehicle health monitoring system, e- ticketing and public information system (in-bus information regarding routes, bus timings etc) would be introduced. These features would be incorporated in 30 new hybrid buses and 20 hop-off and hop-on buses.
Under the integrated traffic management system, 28 major junctions of the city would be redesigned. Features like demand responsive traffic signals, variable message sign boards and traffic law enforcement through information technology applications would be incorporated. Apart from this, real time traffic management system is also on the cards. This is aimed at developing an integrated platform to centralize management of all traffic systems such as traffic signal control and traffic monitoring. For reducing traffic congestion, special corridor plans would also be charted.
Under the city surveillance component, 208 modern surveillance cameras would cover 90 locations around the city. To monitor these cameras, integrated command and control centre would be set up. This would enable analysis of videos for incident management. The centre would also issue e-challans based on the footage in case of traffic law violation.
As part of the smart city programme, the authorities would develop a transportation app and MERAGRA smart card. The card would help citizens access hassle-free public transportation, parking and paying taxes.
Under the smart parking management system, AMC would develop multi-level parking facilities at nine locations in the city. These would be at Sikandra Road (NH 2), Hathras Road (NH 93), Firozabad Road (NH 93), Fatehabad Road (SH 62), Shamshabad Road (SH 62), Gwalior Road (NH 3), Jagner Road (SH 39), Fatehpur Sikri Road (NH 11) and Bharatpur Road (NH 9).
Superintendent of police RK Singh said, “Each and every plan is aimed at upgrading mobility in the city. Suitable implementation of urban mobility plans will sort out traffic-related problems.”