by Wang Di, Bui Long
HANOI, March 27 (Xinhua) -- A typical morning journey of one motorbike rider here includes transporting his little daughter from their house in a narrow alley to Nguyen Trai Road, stopping for a roadside breakfast and getting back on the "iron horse" to gallop to her primary school.
The journey ends at the rider's downtown office, but this routine may soon be gone.
"Motorbikes will be banned from running on two key roads leading to the downtown area in rush hours on weekdays. And the ban will be extended to all urban districts. That means I will have to buy a car, or take a taxi or use public transport," motorbike rider Nguyen Tien Phuong told Xinhua on Tuesday.
"My wife and I are just office clerks, struggling to make ends meet, so owning a car or taking taxis everyday is out of our reach."
According to a plan drafted by Hanoi's department of transport, within the next two years, the city will ban motorbikes from running on Nguyen Trai Road, and after 2020 when the second urban railway becomes operational, it will ban bikes from running on Xuan Thuy-Cau Giay Road.
Between 2021 and 2030, similar bans will be gradually applied in the four districts of Ba Dinh, Hoan Kiem, Dong Da and Hai Ba Trung. The city has decided to ban all motorbikes from running in its urban districts from 2030.
Many local transport experts and residents agree with the motorbike restriction roadmap.
"It is necessary to build a roadmap on banning motorbikes because traffic congestion has become more and more complex on many roads and streets in Hanoi," Nguyen Van Thanh, former head of the Vietnam Automobile Transportation Association, told Xinhua.
In addition to the roadmap, Hanoi should focus on developing its public transport systems, including buses and urban railways, he said.
Thanh's view was echoed by another transport expert, Luong Hoai Nam, who said that banning motorbikes will create favorable conditions for bus systems to thrive.
Such conditions include more space on the roads for an increased number of buses to run more quickly and safely, and increased revenue for reinvestment, especially for raising the number of busses, including BRT (Bus Rapid Transit), minibuses and bus stops.
People who live far from main streets can walk or cycle to bus stops or urban railway stations, Nam said, adding that Hanoi can develop a system of minibuses, as China's Hong Kong has done for decades, to serve areas where standard bus lines do not operate efficiently.
"Public transportation in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City is poor now. It can meets around 10 percent of people's demand for commuting. More than 80 percent of residents commute by motorbike," Nam said, noting that Vietnam only had 4 million motorbikes in 1996, but nearly 60 million units at present.
Meanwhile some experts and residents have expressed concerns over the potential bans' negative impact.
According to transport expert Nguyen Xuan Thuy, in Hanoi, most people use motorbikes to commute or for work, such as "xe om" (motorbike taxi riders) and shippers, while public transport currently meets only 10 percent of the demand. The ban, hence, will badly affect daily lives and livelihoods of many residents, especially those of low-income.
"Buses don't run or stop near my house, the school or the market," schoolteacher Nguyen Hoang Lan said, proposing that offices of many big state agencies, organizations and universities should be relocated to Hanoi's outskirts to minimize traffic congestion.
After the ban, more bus stops and parking lots and minibuses with low fares should be made available as soon as possible, she said.
Amid such worries, Vu Van Vien, director of Hanoi's department of transport, has recently told reporters that when the motorbike ban is in place, people in 80 percent of areas in the city center can get access to public transport systems within a radius of less than 500 meters, and the remaining 20 percent can walk or use bicycles or taxis
