Assessing Spatial Accessibility to Amenities, Facilities, and Services from Public Transit Using Non-motorized Transport: A Case of Nagpur City

Abstract

AbstractIn developing nations, studies on accessibility planning using non-motorized transport (NMT) are still in nascent stage of progress. Even though, there is an intense planning for public transit (PT) in Indian cities, last mile connectivity is not the primary concern in most of the planning exercises. Therefore, in most of the cities, there is lack of accessibility to amenities, facilities, and services (AFS) using NMT. This study focuses on measuring accessibility to AFS using NMT from PT in an Indian city, Nagpur and develops NMT indices using various parameters like built density of residential and commercial, mixed land use, entropy, near, and network distance in macro-level and micro-level evaluation. The results show that Nagpur city has higher levels of access from PT to AFS within 400 m of network distance and planning measures like density and land use mix display the city’s potential for making it friendly for walking and cycling. But lack of infrastructure prevents NMT from being used. This study suggests both macro-and micro-level assessment should be evaluated for formulating planning strategies and policies for NMT to improve the overall accessibility of the city.KeywordsWalkabilityAccessibilityNon-motorized transportPublic transitLast mile connectivity