Syllabus: GS-III, Subject: Economy, Topic: Infrastructure, Issue: Infrastructure- Road and Highways
Context: Road Transport and Highways Minister announced plans for a new highway toll collection system.
Proposed Highway Tolling System:
- Involves fitting vehicles with On-Board Units (OBUs) for tracking.
- GAGAN, with 10-meter accuracy, to map vehicle locations.
- Toll rates will be assigned based on highway coordinates and distance traveled, deducted from a linked OBU wallet.
- Aims to enable pay-as-you-use tolling and eventually barrier-free movement.
    Challenges:
- Recovering toll from non-compliant users presents a major challenge.
- Lack of barriers makes it difficult to stop non-compliant vehicles.
- Vehicles traveling without an OBU, deliberate OBU switch-off, or misuse of OBUs.
Conclusion:
- Requirement for OBUs in vehicles need to be mandated by regulations.
- The new tolling system to coexist with FASTag-based toll collection.
- Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 to address privacy concerns.
- Use of GAGAN satellite system instead of GPS will ensure data remains within India.
| Prelims Connect (Technology in News):
On-board units (OBUs) are electronic devices that are installed in vehicles. They can collect and transmit data for various applications. The GPS Aided Geo Augmented Navigation (GAGAN) system: developed by the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), together with Airports Authority of India (AAI), to deploy and certify an operational satellite-based augmentation system (SBAS). Â |
