Citizens cite traffic snarls on Pune-Mumbai highway

Indian Express

06-07-2025

Amid demands to dismantle the Bus Rapid Transit System (BRTS), especially on the Pune-Mumbai Highway to avoid traffic congestion, the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation termed the bus system as 'efficient', while claiming that it has 'transformed daily travel and eased life for the commuters'.
According to the administration, the BRTS provides 7,389 trips daily across five corridors, with over 3.6 lakh daily passengers, ensuring buses at every 90 seconds.
'At a time when urban transport systems are under pressure, Pimpri Chinchwad has shown how timely infrastructure investments in BRTS can transform daily commutes,' said PCMC Commissioner Shekhar Singh.
'With one bus available every 90 seconds and reliable travel times, our BRTS is not only easing congestion but also setting the foundation for sustainable, people-centric mobility,' he added.
The Nigdi–Dapodi corridor is the backbone of the network, facilitating over 1.5 lakh passengers daily, he said. The corridor connects major destinations including the PCMC Head Office, Swargate, and Shivaji Nagar.
Between 6 am and 8 am, BRTS carries 2,000 to 3,000 passengers per hour on this route, the civic administration said.
However, advocate Sushil Mancharkar, who has been demanding the scrapping of the BRTS route on the Pune-Mumbai highway said, 'The highway right from Nigdi to Dapodi has become a chaotic one. There is Metro service, BRTS service. At some places, there are no footpaths. Mechanics have opened their shops on the side of the highway, and there are other vehicles parked there. The traffic congestion reaches its peak between 4 pm and 10 pm. Motorists and two-wheeler riders are enduring the nightmare of long snarls and jam for years. If BRTS is removed on this stretch, I think it will ease the traffic congestion.'
Iklas Sayeed, a political worker from Akurdi said, the PCMC's top priority should be dismantling the BRTS.
'There are constant traffic snarls on the highway. On top of it, there are encroachments on the stretch from Nashik Phata to Phugewadi. Both PCMC and traffic police have failed to do anything for years.'
The administration, however, said that buses — one in every 2 to 2.5 minutes — are frequent even on other north-south corridors like Dighi–Alandi and Sangvi–Kiwale .
In comparison, the Kalewadi–Chikhali and Nashik Phata–Wakad corridors — which run along the east–west axis — see lower ridership and operate at a frequency of one bus in every 5 to 6 minutes during peak hours, officials said.
'These corridors may seem underutilised today, but we've planned them based on long-term mobility forecasts,' said Bapu Gaikwad, Head of PCMC's Urban Mobility Department.
Seema Sawale, former chairperson of PCMC standing committee, said that PCMC and the traffic police should listen to the grievances of the people.
'Citizens and activists are demanding the scrapping of the BRTS route, especially on the highway to ease the traffic.. Why does the PCMC and traffic not experiment by removing some of the BRTS stretches? For instance, PCMC can remove the stretch between Sandvik company and Kasarwadi subway, between HA, Pimpri and Nashik Phata signal… We need to be dynamic and flexible,' Sawale said.
On the other hand, the PCMC administration claimed that it was actively working, in collaboration with PMPML, to increase the fleet size to help reduce waiting time.
Officials also said that a 10-km commute takes just 20 minutes on BRTS, compared to 50 minutes without a dedicated lane.
Additionally, BRTS enables more efficient fleet management. Without dedicated corridors, PMPML would need to deploy nearly twice the number of buses to maintain the same service levels — a major challenge given the current shortfall of around 2,700 buses, officials said.
According to an analysis by ITDP India, around 96% of Pimpri Chinchwad's population lives within 500 metres of a bus stop, making BRTS an accessible travel option.
'Our user surveys have found that a major segment of passengers on Nigdi-Dapodi are students of the age group 18-25. They make up 47% of the passengers. Other users earn less than Rs 20,000 per month, making it crucial for the city to retain this high-quality transit infrastructure,' said Aditya Rane, senior associate, Transport Systems and Electric Mobility, ITDP India.
Civic chief Singh said that the development of the BRTS in Pimpri Chinchwad is strongly aligned with the National Urban Transport Policy (2006), which prioritises the movement of people over vehicles.
Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades.
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