New Delhi: Delhi government plans to create a heat map of the city traffic and pockets with high vehicular movement, preferred pick and drop areas and areas with high trip density using location coordinates of cabs. The information would be used in policy making and future infrastructure development.
A government official said on Tuesday the state government had opted for this step, leveraging on the necessity for the cab operators in the city to share the location data of their vehicles under the new Cab Aggregator Policy. “Government aims to use this heat map to shape future policies such as placement of electric vehicle charging stations and developing drop-off points,” the official said.
The cab policy says that aggregators must include a feature in their services enabling the rider to share the live location and status of his/her ride after the commencement of a ride booked through an app.
Officials also said that the aggregators would have to periodically share self-reported samples of anonymised trip-wise data which will be used for aggregated pan-Delhi analysis through heat-maps for charging and parking infrastructure assessment. “Delhi is among the leading states to have charging infrastructure but for this to succeed, it is also important that the charging stations are sited are at strategic locations. This data would be helpful in both charging and parking infrastructure assessment,” the official said.
The official added, “While we have data of electric vehicles, we never get to know which areas they are denser in.” The data will also be used by government for creating parking infrastructure as well as future policies related to commercial vehicles.
Delhi has low-cost EV charging stations at 53 locations in the city, with 4,646 charging points and 250 battery swapping stations, as per last year’s data. EV charging stations have also been installed by the municipal bodies and power discoms.
Delhi government is also creating an online portal where it will be compulsory for all cabs and delivery service providers to register. An official of the transport department said the aggregators would have to input the registration numbers of their vehicles and the driving licence details of their drivers.
The policy covers all aggregators providing passenger transport in Delhi as well as those involved in delivery services and e-commerce vehicles, adding that those interested would need to register with government within 90 days from the date of notification and procure a licence, which will be valid for five years.
