03-10-2014, 02:13 PM
Abstracts: Paratransit modes play a significant role in the urban transport sectors of developing countries since in many cities more than half of the total public transport demands are carried by them. Rapid increase in urban population, per capita income, along with inadequate existing transport infrastructures has stimulated their usage as cheap and convenient public transport modes. Paratransit system consists of small passenger capacity vehicles operate on flexible routing and scheduling or fixed routing and flexible scheduling according to the usage of the trip makers. In Indian condition, paratransit plays an important role for the urban passenger transportation, particularly in the small and medium size cities. Mehsana city has been selected in this study. Paratransit modes are the only means of public transportation system in Mehsana. The study gives the detail information about the urban transit scenario of Mehsana city. There are four major types of paratransit modes operating in the study area mainly, city bus service, auto-rickshaws, toofan and maruti van. The characteristics of each mode have been established by conducting different surveys such as modal split, vehicular occupancy, route assignment and operator survey. The survey was carried out on important roads distributed all over the city. The percentage share of paratransit in terms of urban passenger movement has been found out with respect to all the modes. The auto-rickshaw is the most popular mode of paratransit having maximum share in terms of numbers and occupancy rate. The approach to transportation system is to focus not just on increasing vehicle movement, but on improving paratransit modes in the city. Predefined stoppage, parking for paratransit modes are essential to have better and timely service of the paratransit.