The Chief Minister of Gujarat Shri Bhupendra Patel inaugurated today the 17th Urban Mobility India Conference & Expo-2024 at Mahatma Mandir Convention Centre in Gandhinagar, Gujarat. Shri Harsh Sanghavi, The Minister of State for Home and Transport,  Government of Gujarat, Shri Srinivas R Katikithala, Secretary, MoHUA, Government of India; Shri Raj Kumar, Chief Secretary, Gujarat were present on the occasion along with senior officials from Central and State governments, policy makers, Managing Directors of Metro Rail Companies, Chief Executives of transport undertakings, international experts. More than 2000 professionals and academicians are taking part in this conference.

Shri Patel in his address said that India being the 5^th largest economy in the World has progressed tremendously, particularly during the last 10 years. Social, economic and urban sector have provided enough opportunities for sustainable urban transport and making the cities liveable. It has made efforts in improving the infrastructure for making urban transport efficient and effective. The Chief Minister said that under the leadership of Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi ji, Gujarat has made significant progress during the last 23 years and the State budget under Urban Development has increased from 750 crore to 21,000 crore in the current year.

Shri Patel said “Prime Minister started BRTS in Ahmedabad which was a game changer in urban transport. Metro services in Ahmedabad is a life line for lakhs of people in Ahmedabad.” A number of scheme have been taken up by the state government, some of the important schemes are Sabarmati River Front, BRTS system in Ahmedabad and Surat, Metro Rail system in Ahmedabad, multi-level parking in many cities, etc.

The 17^th UMI Conference & Exhibition 2024 is being organized by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs through the Institute of Urban Transport (India) and with the support of Government of Gujarat and Gujarat Metro Rail Corporation Ltd. from 25^th to 27^th October, 2024. 

This year, the theme of Conference is “Standardisation and Optimisation of Urban Transport Solutions”. It will emphasize on harmonising standards for Optimising urban mobility particularly in the Indian context. It will deliberate on the framework for integration of various modes in urban mobility, multilateral and bilateral funding in view of the Make in India policy, importance of big data for transport planning, E-Bus Eco-system in India, benchmarking of cost in Metro system, digital public infrastructure principles in relation to E-Bus transition, innovative financing and other issues and challenges in Urban transport.  It will also dwell on vision for clean air cities, urban freight, urban transport solutions for small and middle towns in India, the need of the hour is to optimise and standardise the urban transport solutions to have efficient and effective system.

On this occasion, Shri Harsh Sanghavi, Hon’ble Minister of State for Home & Transport elaborated on the efforts being made in urban transport system by following the triple S principal such as Sustainable, Sensitive and Smart. He said “thousands of people avail the facility of metro in Gandhinagar and Ahmedabad daily and Surat metro also will be operational soon in the state. This conference will facilitate new ideas from other states in urban transport, it is a need of time to focus on green mobility now.”

Earlier the Chief Minister inaugurated the exhibition showcasing latest development in urban transport system, technology, services by various metro organization, public sector agencies and other startups.

The closing ceremony of this conference will be held on October 27,2024 under the chairmanship of Union Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Shri Manoharlal Khattar and in the presence of Union Minister of State Shri Tokhan Sahoo and Gujarat Transport Minister Shri Harsh Sanghvi. During the closing ceremony, the winners of “Best Practices Project in Urban Transport” will be awarded to state and city authorities in a total of 9 categories.

 

AP/GP/JD

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