As we observe the World Environment Day on June 5, the last year has been a grim reminder of the need for action towards ‘Ecosystem Restoration’, the theme for 2021. The pandemic is most certainly an unprecedented crisis, but another global emergency that necessitates urgent action with each passing year is that of climate change.

Four underlying trends will shape the future of urbanisation in India. One, India will continue urbanising rapidly for the next few decades. From 62 million in 1951, its urban population went up to 377 million in 2011.

Rejeet Mathews in NIUA’s E-Gov magazine (scroll down to page 34)

Amit Bhatt and Jagriti Arora in Traffic InfraTech, Turn to Page 51

RIVERS CHANGE course, forests catch flame, glaciers melt: Raj Bhagat Palanichamy of the World Resources Institute India, a research centre, has tracked all of these injuries to India’s landscape through satellite images. In the past year, he has been trying to map a different kind of harm, identifying infection hotspots, pinpointing hospital beds and cross-checking official fatality numbers by examining infrared images of the fires at crematoria.

The Central Government launched its Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Electric Vehicles (FAME) in India scheme in 2015 to promote the manufacturing and adoption of electric vehicles.

मणि भूषण झा, डॉ. अजय सिंह नागपुरे, गाँव कनेक्शन, 16 April 2021

Nearly two weeks after Delhi Traffic Police (DTP) started a junction improvement trial at Delhi Gate, they are now planning to redesign the intersection with semi-permanent structures, officials said Wednesday.

According to the CEEW Centre for Energy Finance’s (CEEW-CEF) electric mobility dashboard, the e-mobility sector in India has been slowly pulling itself out of the COVID-19 induced slump recording nearly 1.35 lakh electric vehicle (EV) registrations in FY21.

The United States (US) will support India's bid to achieve ambitious renewable energy targets by facilitating affordable access to green technologies and finance, US Special Presidential Envoy on Climate John Kerry told Prime Minister Narendra Modi at a meeting on April 7.

Faced with the ₹5,182-crore Kochi metro encountering a daily loss of around ₹1 crore and recording not even 10% of the passenger patronage mentioned in the DPR, urban transport experts are demanding that metro neo, metro lite, or modernised bus transport systems be adopted for its extensions and for mass rapid transport systems (MRTS) mooted for Thiruvananthapuram and Kozhikode.

By 2030, India’s urban population is expected to nearly double to 600 million. Cities have always attracted migrants who come to urban areas in search of better opportunities. However, this increased urbanization will put enormous pressure on infrastructure and increase pollution as well.

India’s urban population is projected to grow from about 377 million in 2011 to about 850 million by 2050 – that is, more than double within the span of just 40 years. The UN urban population projections indicate that India will have some of the most populous cities in the world by 2030.

The traffic intersection at Delhi Gate is turning pedestrian-friendly with the use of cones and painted structures to demarcate the walking zone. The month-long trial started on Friday. While conducting a survey of roads, intersection and road signage, Delhi traffic police (DTP) was advised to make some changes at Delhi Gate by experts of World Resources Institute (WRI), the survey collaborator.

The view of Delhi Gate crossing is not the same anymore. You won’t see bikers jumping signals and cars cutting lanes there now.

In order to make the city roads safer for pedestrians and to reduce accidents, the city traffic police will conduct a junction-improvement trial at the Delhi Gate intersection, which is infamous for accidents and has been declared one of the top black spots in the city. The trial will commence from April 2 (Friday) and will continue for a few weeks. During the trial, the police will test the proposed design changes for the busy junction by deploying cones, barricades and planters.