Cars travelling into HCMC‘s center to pay fees

Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai has allowed Ho Chi Minh City to pilot electronic road tolls for cars running through the city's center in an effort to ease traffic congestion, according to the government’s website chinhphu.vn.

The decision was made after Ho Chi Minh City late last year submitted a plan mapping out an electronic toll collection system for cars using the streets in District 1 and 3.

The city-based Innovative Technology Development Corp. (ITD), the developer of the plan, said the system will run on a trial basis for six months. The road toll imposed on cars will vary between streets, with the more crowded streets having higher fees.

According to ITD, the Electronic Road Pricing (ERP) is a traffic management solution that has been applied in Singapore and London, which has helped reduce traffic flow in London by about 20 percent.

Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai also asked HCMC to draft out a plan to strictly manage vehicle registration and tighten the operation of taxis in the city.

The Ministry of Construction was asked to accelerate the progress of new urban projects in order to reduce the population density inside HCMC.

Khuat Viet Hung, director of the Advisory Center for Transport Development in HCMC, said the city is now home to 3.6 million motorcycles, which take up 2.5 million square meters of road space. Meanwhile, an estimated 410,000 cars are using 4.4 million square meters, or 50-60 percent, of available road space.

Traffic congestion in the city has been a nightmare for planners over the past few years.

Meanwhile, the HCMC Traffic Police Office said the area for urban transportation in HCMC only makes up four to five percent of the total land, compared to the world standard of 10-20 percent, while more vehicles are licensed inside the city each day.

Meanwhile, environmental experts said the indexes of carbon dioxide, dust and other poisonous substances in HCMC have reached alarming levels.