The authorities in HCM City will charge cars entering the city centre from 2021 while carrying out more measures to ease congestion and environmental pollution in the city.
The resolution about strengthening public transportation and limiting personal vehicles has been approved by HCM City People’s Council.
According to the resolution, HCM City will start charging cars entering the city centre from 2021 to 2025, setting up emission control areas and charging environment pollution fees from 2021 to 2030, and pursuing transit-oriented urban development during 2021-2030 period.
The city people’s council emphasised that they need a synchronised solution to control personal vehicles and public consensus. Before limiting personal vehicles, HCM City authorities must ensure that all requirements about infrastructure, public bus networks, metro lines, parking lots for motorbikes and public bicycle services are met.
Previously, HCM City People’s Committee proposed 17 solutions to strengthen public transportation by 2030 including completing the metro lines 1, 2 and 5 on time, completing several bus rapid transit routes, investing in minibuses and launching public electric motorbike and bicycle services.
Moreover, the authorities must have plans to ease population density in the city centre, establish more pedestrian areas and adjust the working hours to ease congestion.
From 2021 to 2025, HCM City will focus on developing the public bus system, organise the traffic flow for motorbikes in the city centre. From 2026 to 2030, the city will start limiting personal vehicles and developing mass transit systems. The total project investment is VND393trn (USD17bn), of which VND47.6trn is from the state budget and the rest will come from ODA loans.
Collecting the entrance fees will help ease congestion in the city centre. Lam Thieu Quan, General Director of Innovative Technology Development Corporation which had been granted permission to carry out the research on installing automatic tollbooths to collect tolls from cars entering the city centre. The project will use state budget.
“The research team had proposed before that state agency should manage the charge and a third party will be responsible for maintaining and operating the technical system,” Quan said.
Nguyen Le Ninh, a member of HCMC’s Scientific, Technical, and Environmental Advisory Council, said HCM City should focus more on applying technology in management and operation. In the long-term, HCM City should develop residential areas to reduce travelling demands.
This article was originally published in Dtinews