Discussions under way to make Chennai cycle-friendly

CHENNAI: Even as the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority (CMDA) is in a process to prepare a vision document for the Third Master Plan for the city, a discussion was held at the headquarters of the planning authority to integrate cycling in the master plan.

During the meeting, representatives from the ITDP (Institute for Transportation and Development Policy), Dutch Cycling Embassy and others participated along with CMDA member secretary Anshul Mishra. Apart from integrating cycling in the Third Master Plan, the experts discussed the feasibility of providing cycle tracks in city roads and providing other related infrastructure.

Sustainable urban mobility, cycling policy, transit oriented development plan and multi-modal integration were also discussed. Few of the topics that were discussed pertaining to cycling are bicycle lanes linking to metro stations, extending and improving the cycle sharing system and facilitating bicycle parking.

Meanwhile, Chennai Unified Metropolitan Transport Authority (CUMTA) is also planning to integrate cycling in its comprehensive mobility plan (CMP), which is under preparation. It may be noted that the cycle sharing system launched by the Greater Chennai Corporation remains a non-starter even after several years.

On the other hand, the planning authority has requested the public to share views and suggestions for vision documents by visiting www. cmavision.in website.