Besides the steering board, headed by standing deputy secretary of the city Party Committee Tat Thanh Cang, the city People’s Committee in November last year issued a detail plan with seven groups of solutions and 160 specific missions to carry out the program.
The plan sets a target that public passenger transport will meet 15-20 percent of urban traffic demand by 2020.
The city People’s Committee required to keep the number of bus commuters not reduce in the first half this year and get a year on year increase in the second half, said director of the Department of Transport Bui Xuan Cuong.
The department has reorganized bus routes to facilitate passengers’ travel and is now working with relevant sides to build a project to re-plan bus route network by 2025 with visions till 2030.
In addition, the agency has built, upgraded and broadened bus stations near Saigon Bridge, Cho Lon station and Tan Phu station; opened new bus routes; renewed about 100 bus stops and gradually replaced the old bus fleet with new environmentally friendly vehicles.
The agency has also applied information technology in bus supervision and management to improve the service’s quality.
HCMC Public Passenger Transport Management and Operation Center has worked with criminal police force to ensure order and security on buses to set passengers’ minds at rest while travelling by buses.
Efforts since early this year have increased the number of public transport passengers by 2.6 percent over the same period last year, of these subsidized bus service hiked 2.3 percent.
Traffic infrastructure development
According to reports by the city People’s Committee, city leaders have required implementation of many synchronous solutions to obtain purposes under the traffic breakthrough program. Of these, the city has supplemented into the city’s traffic development plan by 2020 projects to build Can Gio and Cat Lai bridges to replace Binh Khanh and Cat Lai ferries, build a parallel road with Highway 50 running from HCMC to some provinces in the Mekong Delta.
The Prime Minister has approved some projects submitted by the city People’s Committee to urgently tackle traffic jam.
Since 2016, the city has put into operation a slew of traffic works such as Phu Huu bridge in the eastern ring road, Tan Son Nhat-Binh Loi outer belt road, broadened Tran Nao street in District 2, an approach road to Phu Huu seaport and N31A canal bridge in provincial road 8.
Other works comprise a branch of the flyover above Go Vap crossroads, Hang Trong bridge, expanded Phan Van Tri street in Go Vap, Rach Hop 1 bridge in Hiep Phuoc industrial park in Nha Be district, a flyover in Go Vap crossroads and a road beneath My Thuy bridge in District 2.
The above works have contributed in lengthening newly built roads by 66 kilometers and increasing the number of new bridges by 12 ones in the city.
Leaders of the Department of Transport said that some traffic works would be built before schedule from now until the end of the year such as Tan Son Nhat flyover and Nguyen Thai Son roundabout flyover.
The agency will strive to complete other key traffic works such as An Suong tunnel, My Thuy intersection, Hanoi Highway upgrading project to complete traffic works as per plan and reduce traffic jam for the city by the end of this year.
