Gurgaon Citizens Want Odd-Even Rule for Reduction in Traffic

With pollution levels up to 8 times above the safe limit on some days, the experiment hoped to tackle the problem by allowing only cars with odd-numbered plates to be used on odd days, cars with even-numbered plates on even days and shut schools for two weeks.

The trial took more than a third of the city’s three million private cars off the road, easing congestion.

Rai said 4,500 people availed of the carpool facility provided by the Delhi government’s PoochhO App.

After full-fledged celebrations planned on Sunday to mark the success of the formula, the Kejriwal government will hold a review meeting a day later to explore ways and means aimed to restart the scheme after placing all plans -such as more buses for improved public transport-in place.

He said there was a need to re-work the fines that can be imposed for traffic violations and sought directions from the court to the Centre in this regard.

The Delhi government’s odd-even restriction on movement of four-wheelers will come to an end amid indications that it would be reintroduced in the future.

He said air samples collected by around 20 mobile teams of the Delhi Pollution Control Committee from different locations showed that pollution levels in inner Delhi areas had gone down. “It is a question of our health, our children’s health, our city”, he said in a press conference on Friday. “It was a tough call”, said Kejriwal, “but the people of Delhi stood by it, followed it”.

“As per our analysis, peak pollution levels during smog episodes dropped considerably”.

“There is no drastic change in pollution levels, but Delhiites certainly got a respite from long snarls-up”, Tongad told IANS, adding it would be hard to determine exactly how much pollution lessened due to the scheme.

“In inner Delhi, the average PM 2.5 level was around 300 micrograms/m3”.

“Pollution did go down, yes… but there was also less traffic congestion”, Kejriwal claimed.

“In the short-term, meteorological variables such as temperature, wind speed and precipitation have a significant impact, and as a result it is hard to provide conclusive evidence on the impact of the odd-even policy on air quality”, said a CEEW statement.