Master Techniques from Japan to the World 3

Toward Constructing Smart Cities in India Aimed at Realizing a Society with Low-Carbon Energy
Academic cooperation between Japan and India

A SATREPS workshop held in Ahmedabad City, India (from the right end: Prof. Fukuda, Prof. Emeritus Desai, and Dr. Tsuboi) (Photo: IITH laboratory)

IITH researchers conducting image analysis of intersections sin Ahmedabad (Photo: IITH laboratory)

In urban areas of India, serious traffic congestion and air pollution have been caused by a sudden increase in traffic volume with economic development. This has become a major problem affecting not only general economic activities, but also the residents’ health. Moreover, from the perspective of global warming, it is necessary to reduce CO2 emissions from vehicles. It has become an urgent matter to increase the energy efficiency in the transportation sector, and the Government of India has set a policy to make 100 cities environmentally-friendly “smart cities*1.” It aims to improve traffic congestion and reduce CO2 emissions by promoting a multi-modal system*2, which makes efficient use of a combination of various transportation methods, especially public transportation such as subways and buses.

In order to support this initiative by the Government of India, a research group led by Dr. TSUBOI Tsutomu, Project Leader at NAGOYA ELECTRIC WORKS CO.,LTD., which provides road information equipment in Japan, and Prof. FUKUDA Atsushi of the Department of Transportation Systems Engineering, College of Science and Technology, Nihon University, has been conducting joint research since 2016 with the research group of Prof. Emeritus U.B. Desai of the Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad (IITH) (former Director of IITH) through Science and Technology Research Partnership for Sustainable Development (SATREPS)*3. In addition, the research results thus far have been utilized for active discussions and exchanges of views in academic conferences in various Indian cities such as Hyderabad and Mumbai.

The joint research has been carried out in Ahmedabad, a city with a population of 6.8 million people located in western India. The urban transportation situation was grasped making full use of big data analysis utilizing the latest sensing technologies. The objective of the project is to realize a low-carbon, low-energy society through encouraging residents to shift from using private automobiles to using public transport such as subways and buses, by decentralizing congestion through transmitting the optimal route information to residents’ devices such as smartphones and utilizing control of traffic lights and road information signs.

The project started with monitoring every movement of vehicles and people on major roads in Ahmedabad City, and collecting big data related to traffic flows in the city. In Japan, it is relatively easy to conduct such monitoring via cameras installed on top of telephone poles and other public infrastructure because there are mainly automobiles on the roads. However, in India, it was extremely difficult to get accurate measurements because two-wheelers run in zigzag among automobiles and three-wheeled vehicles and pedestrians move around in a mess at intersections without traffic lights. Therefore, data collection for analysis was conducted through broad overhead observation of the entire traffic situation by utilizing drones in addition to cameras installed in the city.

In addition to establishing a common method for grasping traffic volume all over India, this project also aims to build a system for effective utilization of mobile devices. Dr. Tsuboi tells us that even if infrastructure development is advanced in areas with high needs based on the traffic data observed through this project, major challenges will still remain in order to reduce CO2 emissions and improve the environment in India.

“Currently, subway construction is underway in Ahmedabad. Although it is important to improve infrastructure, it is also important to build a system so that local residents actively use the completed public transportation.”

Dr. Tsuboi is currently working on developing a transportation information application for mobile devices, which enables users to search for transportation methods in a highly flexible way. Such applications used in Japan generally allow users to search for routes by selecting mobility options such as “walk,” “train,” and “car.” If this application is put to use in India, it would become possible to search for all modes of transportation simultaneously, such as driving a car from one’s house to the station, taking a subway to the station closest to one’s destination, and then taking a bus to the destination. By combining various transportation methods, the project aims to encourage users to actively use public transportation that will begin operation in the future. Although it will still take time before the railways in Indian cities run like a mesh as in Tokyo, it is expected that the more people use the new public transport, the more likely it will lead to a multi-modal shift of the urban transportation as well as improvement of environmental problems through the reduction of CO2 emissions.

There are currently about 400 cities in India with populations of over 300,000 to 400,000 people. Furthermore, it is also said that there are already more than 200 cities that need to become smart cities against the backdrop of rapid economic development in recent years. Therefore, a new transportation innovation through this project, which would serve as a compass in India, is much awaited.

*1 Sustainable cities or districts, where management (planning, maintenance, administration and operation, etc.) is carried out and total optimization is intended through utilization of new technologies such as ICT in order to address the various issues faced by cities.

*2 Building an efficient and favorable transportation environment that meets the needs of users through coordination among transportation organizations.

*3 See “Glossary".