The Ministry of Urban Development has come out with a multi-pronged policy framework to promote living close to mass urban transit corridors to address the emerging urbanization challenges.
This new initiatives would promote ‘Transit Oriented Development (TOD)’ which enables people to live within walking or cycling distance from transit corridors like the Metros, Monorail and Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) corridors, currently being taken up on a large scale, said a senior officer of the Urban Development Ministry.
The Ministry has already formulated a ‘National Transit Oriented Development Policy’ which would be discussed with the States and Union Territories at a National Workshop on Urban Development to be held Tuesday next week.
This policy seeks to enhance the depth of understanding of States and UTs on TOD as a viable solution to many of the challenges including haphazard urban growth and sprawl, mobility, rapidly rising private vehicles on roads and pollution, the Ministry said.
“This new urban design and planning in the form of TOD, is being incentivised by the Ministry under two more initiatives mainly Metro Policy and Green Urban Mobility Scheme,” the officer said.
Under TOD, city densification will be promoted along mass transit corridors through vertical construction by substantially enhancing FARs (Floor Area Ratio) backed by promotion of Non-motorised Transport Infrastructure for walking and cycling to transport stations, development of street networks in the influence zone of transit corridors, multi-modal integration, effective first and last mile connectivity through feeder services to enable people access public transit in 5 to 10 minutes from home and work places, the Ministry said.
“Dense living along transit corridors besides resulting in enhanced living and travel experience, will also improve ridership of mass transit systems. If properly executed, TOD could emerge as a means of financing mass transit project, for which the demand is growing,” the Ministry said.