Small City Mobility: Windows for Policy Knowledge
Nagrika is undertaking an extensive literature review of transport and mobility across Indian and global contexts. We have reviewed more than 50 studies produced post-2010 to evaluate issues around urban mobility. Through our review, we identified multiple windows which can be built upon to create policy based solutions for sustainable mobility in small and mid-sized cities. Some of these windows include Knowledge on Mobility in Small Cities; Context Specific Knowledge on Mobility; Frequency and Timeliness of Knowledge and; Diversity of Knowledge Producing Institutions.
The literature reviewed was varied in nature and included national and international research papers, working papers, transport reports, vision documents, publicly accessible mobility and development plans, publicly accessible consultancy reports and research from non-governmental organisations, independent think tanks and multilateral institutions. The identified windows are discussed below.
Limited Knowledge on Mobility in Small Cities
Our review reveals that disproportionate attention in the policy sphere is placed on larger cities and is reflected in the public transport research landscape as well. Most national-level studies are limited to metropolitan cities. Out of the 52 studies evaluated, 18 studies were found to be entirely based on metro cities and 7 on non-metros. Of the remaining, another 27 had general inferences for both metro and non-metro cities. The deductions in the studies which focus on both metro and non-metro, however, discussed transport mobility from the perspective of larger metro cities like Delhi and Mumbai. These studies generalise their conclusions for transport where metro city issues are highlighted and addressed with an assumption of similar impacts on non-metro or smaller cities. There is very little discussion on non-metro specific issues and opportunities. This gap underlines the lack of readily available and reliable data on smaller cities.
Availability of Context Specific Knowledge on Mobility
80% of the transport studies which were focused on smaller cities were limited to individual cities. The exploration of small cities as discrete places instead of a group of Indian cities with similar characteristics, isolates every city’s context to the region. Even though this is helpful in understanding the local issues of the city, there is a missing link that can tie it to the larger context and hence informing the perception of other similar cities. Specifically we found an under-representation of cities in the hills and coasts. Geographically, most studies focused on the northern parts of the country.
The national-level studies encompassing both small and large cities additionally only looked at broad regional brackets, such as ‘North India’ and ‘East India’. This broad aggregation of regional categories does not recognise the variance within the same regions. Geographical areas like the hilly or coastal regions were not considered as factors in selecting survey areas and respondents. Kochi and Ooty both belong to South India, but their transport needs are very different.
Frequency and Timeliness of Knowledge
A number of the papers point to the fact that India does not have comprehensive data on public transport in cities, let alone in smaller ones. On the larger transport research front, feasibility studies and research papers often depend upon publicly available data on transport produced by governmental or private bodies.
The data used is often outdated. The largest data collection drive in the country, the Census, takes place every ten years. Many of the studies use Census data as the basis for population data of a city. The Ministry of Road Transport & Highways collects road accident reports every year but only for million plus cities. Same is true for the annual data produced by Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MORTH) which publishes vehicle registration data every year but only for million plus cities and at the state level. Though now MORTH provides some critical data through its Vahan dashboard for various RTOs, it is still at an aggregate level. For example while total registrations under an RTO are available, the categorisation by vehicle type is not available.
Limited Diversity of Knowledge Producing Institutions
Almost 54% of the research we reviewed was produced by academic sources. Of these academic studies, almost 54% were focused on larger metros, 28% on both metros and non-metros and 18% on non-metros. There was also an abundance of individual academic papers for transport. Also, the research produced by research wings of corporate houses often had the most recent data available on urban mobility patterns. For-profit corporations which are involved in various aspects of transportation - road networks, electric vehicles, and smart transport solutions, to name a few can constitute conflict of interest towards supporting the services they provide.
Looking Forward
These four windows identified as part of our ongoing transport and mobility research review capture some of the larger trends in the currently available knowledge on mobility. These windows may provide an opportunity to build context specific policy-level interventions for smaller cities. Addressing these windows can improve policy-efficiency in addressing contextual concerns as filling these knowledge gaps will help bridge the distance between perceived and actual needs of cities.
In the coming weeks, Nagrika intends to further elaborate on these windows within the academic, governmental, consultancy and non-governmental knowledge.
This piece is part of the Small City Mobility Series of the Nagrikal. Nagrikal is a platform for citizens from small cities to share their experiences so that they be channeled into policies.