Hyderabad: An experiment in Hyderabad has found that small steps like increased parking fee and subsidised public transport might not encourage too many people to give up the use of private vehicles. The study also found that the social status attached to using a personal car encourages people to give public transport a miss. The experiment was conducted by the researchers with employees from universities, IT companies and government offices as respondents.
“Introduction of the bus subsidy or parking fee initially has a positive effect on the group. But over time, we see an increase in people choosing private cars,” researchers said. The study was led by Dr Bhuvanachitra Chidambaram from the Humboldt University of Berlin in collaboration with researchers from the Arizona State University.
