LAHORE: Urbanisation creates both opportunities and challenges and being the second largest city of Pakistan, Lahore is prone to traffic and accessibility issues.

The estimated number of vehicles in Lahore is about 6.2m that makes around 32pc of the total vehicles in Punjab.

A research on the Lahore Orange Line Metro Train (OLMT), the first mass transit rail project of Pakistan, recently conducted by the Research for Social Transformation and Advancement (RASTA) of Pakistan Institute of Development Economics (PIDE) has explored the viability of the project for sustainable urban mobility. The research found that 68pc OLMT passengers were satisfied with Lahore transportation system and 81pc found transportation options adequate for reaching their destinations. Furthermore, 59pc people who were using alternative modes of travel experienced traffic congestion on a daily basis.

The reason for the non-users for not changing their current travel mode for the OLMT was the information gap on the connectivity networks, routes, timings and the nearest OLMT entry/exit stations. Despite facing discomfort and inconvenience in their daily travel, 68pc people in the survey were unaware about the transportation networks of Lahore in terms of connectivity.

Research finds 68pc of passengers satisfied with mass transit system

The research also found that the OLMT has brought locational efficiency and gender inclusiveness while 51pc commuters’ destination was workplace and 33pc commuted for education purposes among whom the larger proportion was of women.

The research found a considerable proportion of passengers as the choice riders as 45pc owned personal vehicles but preferred to use this public transport. Among the vehicle-less individuals, 48pc were previously using rickshaws and 7pc were using private taxi service and this segment of passengers also faced higher travel costs.

The main reason for favouring the OLMT over alternative travelling modes was the daily expenses. There were 36pc commuters whose past expenses were more than Rs200 and 21pc faced the daily cost of Rs150 to Rs200 before shifting to the OLMT.

Thus, this rail transit has proved crucial in providing basic mobility and social inclusion to a large segment of society. Furthermore, among the vehicleless passengers belonging to households with vehicle ownership, many were women facing forced immobility in terms of dependency on shared transport. It was also found that 32pc passengers were experiencing daily travel cost of more than Rs70 per trip on rickshaw but shifted to the OLMT. Moreover, 22pc motorcyclists with daily average cost of Rs200 and 13pc car users with travel expense of more than Rs200 shifted to the rail mass transit. This switch of majority rickshaw and two-wheelers commuters to the rail transit, a greener transport, may also help in reducing the carbon footprint, space footprint and traffic congestion on roads.

Despite the minimal fare of the OLMT, the majority of commuters experience additional burden of travel cost due to multi-modal commuting resulting from connectivity gap. The travelling expenses increase by Rs140 and Rs360 with additional use of public transport and private vehicles, respectively. Approximately 40pc passengers require additional transport both at entry and exit stations and majority of them use rickshaw and taxi services.

On the other hand, 21pc riders are facing connectivity gap either at entry or exit stations. Only 29pc commuters do not require any additional transport with OLMT service due to walking distance from commuters’ residence and destination areas.

Thus, the additional burden of travel cost needs to be reduced by making the transport policy of Lahore more compatible with rail mass transit. Similarly, the non-users of the OLMT also faced time-poverty due to the missing connectivity, which discouraged them to shift from their alternate travelling mode. Therefore, connectivity must be improved through provision of affordable feeder buses that could also contribute towards an increase in ridership and revenue generation.

In terms of feasibility and replication of similar rail mass transit projects in other metropolitan cities, it is necessary to support such projects with a well-knitted network of affordable connectivity and awareness without which the welfare gains cannot be maximised.

In addition, the city planning must work on integrating the transit-oriented urban development with walkable connectivity. The current transit system is focusing on objective of affordable substitute to personal vehicles and informal transportation while ignoring the proximity and transit connection for quick accessibility. Without connectivity, the people are less likely to use transit. Moreover, such services are not financially viable if solely supported by government subsidisation as in the case of the Lahore OLMT; and operating below capacity adds to the deficit. Looking upon some world examples, mass transits in Tokyo, Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Singapore are mostly commercially operated. Therefore, on similar grounds, the public-private partnership is necessitated for further advancement of rail transits in other cities of Pakistan.

(Alvina Sabah Idrees is RASTA-PIDE research fellow and Assistant Professor of Economics at GCU, Lahore. The research was co-authored by Saima Sarwar.).

Published in Dawn, April 16th, 2023