With the vehicle density increasing at a much faster pace in the city, the Chandigarh Administration will soon come up with a legal framework to promote carpooling here.

The UT Transport Department is chalking out a carpooling policy after studying the laws on car sharing in Singapore and other countries.

“We have planned to come up with a carpooling policy for the union territory of Chandigarh. Shared mobility offers the ideal option to deal with the congestion in the city besides being environmentally conscious and also, socially relevant,” said a senior officer of the UT Administration while talking to The Pioneer.

He said, “The Administration is studying the Singapore laws and various other models on car sharing or carpooling. Some other cities across the world also have in place regulations regarding car sharing.”

“At present, none of the state or city in India has laws related to the carpool. The monetary benefit for carpooling under certain rules and regulations is expected to give boost to this concept in the city,” he added.

Singapore laws allow drivers to receive payments for carpools but the drivers cannot offer more than two rides per day.

The senior bureaucrat further said that the UT Administration is focusing on reducing the number of private vehicles on the road and allowing commercial ride sharing by private car owners is one of the solutions for this.

“We have also planned to come up with a mobile app to promote carpooling. The app is proposed to connect private-car drivers and passengers so they can carpool,” he said.

At present, the commuters are availing the app-based cab services Ola and Uber in the city.

Notably, the planned city of Chandigarh, which came into existence over five decades back, today faces a challenge to deal with the burgeoning vehicular population that has a widespread impact on health and even, quality of life.

Chandigarh has over 2 vehicle per capita household, making it the city with highest density of vehicles in the country, stated a UT Administration’s report while adding that the vehicle emissions have become the major reason of pollution here. The percentage increase in the total number of vehicles in Chandigarh for more than over a decade (2007-2018) has been over 24.5.

As per the records of UT Registering and Licensing Authority Department, a total of 16756 cars or jeeps and more than 27473 two wheelers were registered within the city last year.

Currently, the Chandigarh Transport Department is also conducting a study on road capacity and potential of the city.  Road capacity refers to the maximum traffic flow obtainable on a given roadway using all available lanes and is usually expressed in vehicles per hour or vehicles per day. Road capacity values are critical to analyze the capacity potential of roads in a city.