Infrastructure

Transport

Transport plays a significant role in the economic development of any region. As road transport provides door-to-door connection and flexible movement of goods and passengers, its patronage by people is on the rise day by day. The quality of life now greatly depends on the quality of roads. India has an extensive road network, which provides mobility to millions of people every day. Thus road transport is one of the important growth engines for social and economic development of the country.

India has the third largest road network in the world stretching 4.48 million km in length. According to World Bank, National Highways in India account for 76,818 km, which constitute mere 2 per cent of the total road network, but carry about 40 per cent of the total road traffic in India. Only 24 per cent of the total national highways network has four - lane carriage way and the rest are from single - lane to two - lane standards. Indian Railway is the second largest in the world (63,500 km of route length) under single management. Freight accounts for 67 per cent of total revenue of Railway. Civil Aviation is gradually gaining importance in passenger movement with increase in private participation in operation of airlines and gradual improvements in airport infrastructure.

Other transport modes like inland waterways and coastal shipping are significantly used for freight transport. With an extensive coastline of 7,517 km, India has 12 major ports and 200 minor ports, of which, only 30 ports handle cargo traffic. The total traffic carried by both major and non major ports in recent years was estimated to be 53 million tonnes. However, in terms of domestic freight movement, coastal shipping and inland water transport meet only about one per cent of the total freight traffic demand.

Presence of quality infrastructure is vital for social, economic and industrial development of the country. The transport infrastructure in Kerala largely consists of roads, railways, airports and inland water transport system. Roads play a prominent role in Public Transportation over other modes of transportation owing to the geographic peculiarities of Kerala, widely scattered habitation with lesser rural urban divide and limited geographical area of 38,863 Sq.Km.

The category of roads includes National Highways (NH), State Highways (SH) & Major District Roads (MDR) and PWD & local body roads. The motor vehicle population in Kerala, which was around two lakh in 1980, increased to more than one crore vehicles in 2016. Nearly 65 per cent of registered vehicles in the state are two wheelers. Nearly 25000 buses are on roads in the state and major chunk of this is operated in urban areas causing traffic chaos and congestion. Although road transport dominates the transportation scenario in Kerala, people depend on railways for long distance transport needs.

The transport system in Kerala needs much improvement. Since the road infrastructure plays the pivotal role in the overall development of the State, there should be suitable policy, strategy and planning for repairs or maintenance of roads. Certain criteria should be developed for prioritizing road works in the State. Major emphasis should be in widening the State Highways and Major District Roads along with proper design and adequate drainage facilities.

Road improvements, repair and maintenance of existing roads, development and upgradation are the major activities taken up in the sector during the 11th Five Year Plan. Budgetary support, private finance and institutional supports were used for the purpose. A Road Development Policy has been approved by the Government and PWD Manual & Data Books have been revised. Quality Control Sub Divisions were set up in all districts. Rolling Heavy Maintenance Programmes for the State Highways were introduced to ensure upgradation of the SH and MDRs to cope with the heavy traffic flow on the roads. Web based online services were introduced to provide data base and all the services rendered by the Department. A Road Safety Authority has been set up for implementing various road safety initiatives and to create awareness among the drivers and to public regarding safe driving. Quality infrastructure creation in road construction was the focus area during the 12th Plan.

There is a need to undertake planned development of State Highways, important Major District Roads and City roads in the State which addresses geometrical improvement, junction improvements, re-laying the roads incorporating technical corrections and entering into maintenance contracts.