Foreword
Infrastructure
Transport Infrastructure
Transport infrastructure of the State consists of 2.05 lakh Km of road, 1588 Km of Railways, 1687 Km of Inland Waterways and 18 Ports. Kerala has a total fleet of 25,449 buses, of which 19145 are private buses (75 per cent) and 6304 are KSRTC buses (25 per cent). Private buses dominate the Bus Transport in all districts of Kerala except Thiruvananthapuram. Co-ordination between the physical infrastructure providers – Public Works Department (PWD), Railways, Inland Transport Authority, Airports and Coastal Shipping Agencies to build transport infrastructure and for the operation and the maintenance of the existing ones is required. Physical infrastructure has to be designed to support an intermodal transport network. Road design should be done based on 15 year traffic forecasts even with an intermodal transport network.
Most of the roads in the State do not have adequate width so as to cater to the existing level of traffic and only one fourth of the roads have either two lanes or four lane capacity while most of the roads have single lane or intermediate lane capacity. In the case of National Highways, only about 12 per cent of the roads have four lane capacities while the remaining roads have only two lane or intermediate lane capacity. Bulk of the inter city and interstate traffic are carried out by the National Highways and State Highways which are only eight per cent of the total network. Considering the demand supply gap, there is a huge need for up gradation of existing road network. Table 5.1 shows the outlay and expenditure of Transport Sector under different Five Year Plans.
Table 5.1
Outlay and expenditure of Transport Sector under different Five Year Plans, in lakh
| Five Year Plan | Budgeted Outlay | Expenditure | Per centage of Expenditure |
| Tenth Plan (2002-07) | 247771.00 | 237819.00 | 96 |
| Eleventh Plan (2007-12) | 445881.00 | 658046.00 | 148 |
| Twelfth Plan (2012-17) | 638585.00 | 960728.89* | 209.9 |
*Expenditure of the first four years of plan
Source: Budget,State Planning Board
A comparative analysis of the sector wise outlay and expenditure during the Tenth and Eleventh Five Year Plans reveals that the Transport Sector has utilized 12 per cent of the share of total expenditure of the State against 10 per cent of the share of outlay during the Tenth Plan. This trend continued during the Eleventh Five Year Plan also where the share of total expenditure was 15 per cent against the share of outlay of 10 per cent.
Roads are being maintained by various agencies in Kerala, like Local Self Governments, Public Works Department (Roads & Bridges) and National Highways, Municipalities, Corporations, Irrigation, Forests, and Railways. Other agencies dealing with transport sector are National Transportation Planning and Research Centre (NATPAC), Motor Vehicles Department, Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC), Roads & Bridges Development Corporation of Kerala (RBDCK), Kerala State Transport Project (KSTP), Kerala Road Fund Board (KRFB) and Road Infrastructure Company Kerala (RICK) Ltd.
The outlay and expenditure in the Transport sector during 2014-15 to 2016-17 is given in the Table 5.2.
Table 5.2
Outlay and expenditure in the Transport sector during 2014-15 to 2016-17, in lakh
| Sl No | Sub Sectors | Annual Plan 2014-15 | Annual Plan 2015-16 | Annual Plan 2016-17 | |||
| Outlay | Exp. | Outlay | Expdr. | Outlay | Exp.* | ||
| 1 | Port Department | 9869.00 | 5277.50 (53.48 per cent) | 26928.00 | 20398.41 (75.75 per cent) | 10721.00 | 1176.59 (10.97 per cent) |
| 2 | Roads and Bridges | 83641.00 | 149420.40 (178.64 per cent) | 95107.00 | 229039.04 (240.82 per cent) | 120621.00 | 82731.63 (68.59 per cent) |
| 3 | Road Transport | 10226.00 | 7578.57 (74.11 per cent) | 7425.00 | 4847.68 (65.29 per cent) | 7532.00 | 2061.42 (27.37 per cent) |
| 4 | Inland Waterways | 14342.00 | 3930.93 (27.41 per cent) | 15542.00 | 3336.52 (21.47 per cent) | 15734.00 | 574.90 (3.65 per cent) |
*Upto October 2016
Source: Accounts and Planspace,State Planning Board