College kids design solutions to end city’s commuting woes

From building sensors to gauging traffic congestion in an area to magnetically levitated pods providing public transport, college students came up with innovative design-based solutions for transport-related problems in the city.

The solutions were presented at Mumbai By Design, a festival organised by Pearl Academy — an education institute from Andheri — last week to celebrate the diversity and distinct cultural influences in the city.

One of the competitions titled ‘Design Intervention’ invited design-led innovations to solve daily issues such as traffic management and rail efficiency. Students from 15 institutes present innovative measures and futuristic ideas to address these problems.

Rajat Kushwaha, a student of the Industrial Design Centre at Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay (IIT-B) suggested installing electromagnetic induced charging for electric cars on roads.

“We are using fossil fuels, even though the future belongs to electric vehicles. However, there are no charging stations available electric vehicles. It is possible to charge such vehicles wirelessly through a magnetic field on the city roads. The vehicles won’t even need to stop to recharge,” he said.

Experts welcomed the initiative and said the ideas were very much doable.

“We need new ideas, which may not necessarily come from experts. Even offbeat ideas can solve some of the pressing transport problems in the city. The ideas presented by the students are doable. In fact, they can be implemented in as less than 10 years,” said Ashutosh Atre, a transport expert

Chandrakant Naik, a student from VIVA School of Architecture, Virar, suggested creating multi-storied railway stations to make commute comfortable and efficient. “The city’s population will swell in the coming years. This design will accommodate more people,” he said.

Similarly, Naba Usmani, a student at Pearl Academy, suggested basic modifications to the existing infrastructure and monitoring systems such as digital speed limit boards and thermal and pressure recognition belts for managing pedestrians and traffic.

“The sensors will calculate traffic congestion and send information to a control unit. This information will be used to alter speed limit on certain sections of the road to ensure a smoother flow of traffic,” she said.

Nidhip Mehta, dean of the School of Design, Pearl Academy, said, “A good design has the potential to bring a sense of order to the lives of Mumbaikars while still keeping true to the city’s passion and energy. Mumbai By Design can offer a glimpse of a city that can be systematic, efficient, and full of life and energy.”