Karnataka introduces intelligent transport system

March 20, 2013

Mr Osamu Yoshizaki, Deputy Director General, Road Bureau, MLIT, greeting Ms V. Manjula, Commissioner, Urban Land Transport and Principal Secretary at a conference on Intelligent Transport System for Strategic Urban Development in Indian Cities in Bangalore. - Photo: K. Gopinathan

BANGALORE, FEB. 3:

Karnataka has made a modest beginning in using intelligent transport system (ITS) in urban transport management, said Ms V. Manjula, Principal Secretary, Karnataka Urban Development Department.

Addressing a conference on “Intelligent transport system for strategic urban development in Indian cities’, Ms Manjula said “ITS is the integration of information and communication technology with transport infrastructure, vehicles and users. It enables information to be collected and shared in order to help people make more informed travel choices, make journey more efficient and help to reduce the impact of transport on the environment.”

“Keeping these principles intact in Karnataka, few ITS projects initiated are B-Track in Bangalore by the traffic police.

Passenger information system (PIS) is by the BMTC and the vehicle location system (VLS) for city buses in Mysore,” she added.

As the State is getting urbanised at a faster pace, the use of ITS is becoming increasingly necessary.

Ms Manjula said “Karnataka is one of the more urbanised States in the country with 38 per cent of population living in urban areas. This population is spread over 237 census towns, with almost 66 per cent of the State’s urban population concentrated in 23 cities and Bangalore accounting for almost 11 per cent of the urban population.”

She explained that that ITS is very crucial in managing traffic in urban areas as vehicle density is increasing day by day.

“The growth of urban Karnataka has also brought in its wake of steep increase in the number of motor vehicles, the growth rate ranging from 10 to 14 per cent a year.

The number of vehicles has increased from 16 lakh in 1991 to 83 lakh in two decades,” she said.

B-TRACK

In B-Track project, the traffic management centre processes information collected through surveillance and enforcement cameras installed at various junctions across the Bangalore city, information conveyed through walkie-talkies by traffic policemen, and the plans signal phase timing alterations/congestion monitoring etc.

Information on congestion is conveyed through SMS to registered users of its service and flashed on information boards at vantage points.

GIS/PIS

BMTC has implemented a pilot project on ITS here an automatic vehicle location system is introduced in a limited way by installing GPS units devices on 189 buses.

Buses are tracked on real time basis and all the GPS units are controlled and monitored from a single control room.

Where as for PIS, BMTC has installed at select bus stops and at Bangalore International Airport which gives information on next bus, expected time, route number etc.

VLS

Ms Manjula said VLS is a world Bank-GEF funded project being implemented in Mysore city assisted by SUTP.

This project will be completed by March this year and will become operational from April.

In this project Central control station, automatic vehicle location system, passenger information system are all integrated to one control room through ITS.

source: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/industry-and-economy/logistics/karnataka-introduces-intelligent-transport-system/article2857564.ece