Bhubaneswar, Jan. 10: The state transport authority will regulate private city buses and autorickshaws here to ensure road safety.
As part of the initiative, private stage carriages starting or terminating in the city will not be allowed to have multiple stops from now on. The decision was taken at a traffic management committee meeting held on January 4.
"Private city buses starting from Baramunda or Master Canteen are picking up and dropping passengers in the middle of their routes. This has resulted in a threat to the safety of passengers as well as pedestrians. The practice has also decreased the demand of city bus services," said a transport department official.
He further said that to control such practice, a regulation would come into force, wherein the town buses would be allowed to start and terminate only from designated places. "They will not be allowed to stop anywhere in the middle of the route. If they won't comply with this, their licence will be terminated," said the official.
The authorities will identify three to four more inter-change points, apart from Baramunda and Master Canteen bus stands, from where passengers can be picked up or dropped by private buses. At present, around 50 bus operators are active on the Master Canteen-Baramunda and the Vani Vihar-Patia-Nandankanan routes.
Besides the private buses, Bhubaneswar-Puri Transport Services Limited has been operating the city bus services here since 2010. It has around 92 intra-city buses on 10 routes. The number of daily passengers stands at around 33,000. The city buses run over nearly 400km, while the average commuter trip length is 5 to 6km.
Sources said the recent decision to regulate the private bus and auto-rickshaw services had been taken to increase the demand of public city bus services. The authorities are planning to modernise the city bus project where they will revamp the operation by introducing more buses, higher frequency and carry out studies to formulate the best model in the sector.
"It is arbitrary on part of the government to regulate our services in such a manner. They may want to improve the service, but doing it at the cost of our livelihood is not right. Even if they are planning to keep a check on us, they should at least ensure more inter-change points," said private bus operator Hira Mohanty.
Similarly, the transport authority has also decided to keep tabs on auto-rickshaws in the city. To regulate them, the officials have decided to put a cap on the number of autorickshaws plying in the city. They have also decided to allow the three-wheelers to operate only on the feeder routes.
"There are not enough buses operating in the city - which is forcing many to take autorickshaws. This is also giving an upper hand to the auto-rickshaws, which often charges us arbitrarily. The move to keep tabs on auto-rickshaws is good, but before that they should provide more city buses," said Ghatikia resident Dibakar Pradhan.
