According to a recent report by Ola Mobility Institute, 77 per cent of women in the country feel last mile connectivity needs improvement.  The report titled 'What Do Women and Girls Want from Urban Mobility Systems?' offers a gender disaggregated analysis of the Ease of Moving Index 2018 of Indian cities.

The report is prepared by Ola Mobility Institute (OMI), the think-tank of ride hailing platform Ola that analyses urban mobility in India from a female's perspective. To do that OMI surveyed 9,935 women across 11 Indian cities to assess the current state of mobility ecosystem in the country.

The parameters that these respondents were evaluated upon included demography, non-motorised transport, public transport as well as private motor vehicles. The findings show the need to mainstream gender perspectives for a robust mobility ecosystem in the country.

Almost 59 per cent of the women surveyed use public transport from which 38 per cent are bus users, 35 per cent are metro/train users and 40-45 per cent are rickshaw, on-demand taxi and other shared mode users. The top reasons for women for using public transport were affordability (40 per cent), convenience (26 per cent), time saved (18 per cent) with 15 per cent stating that they had no other option.       

In spite of the fact that large numbers of women are using public transport, not many are satisfied with it; 77 per cent of women felt that last mile connectivity needed to be improved.  In fact, 89 per cent of women felt that the public transport information system could be better designed, so that information is easily available and accessible.     

Several women raised concerns around safety. They suggested the need to have improved street lighting and patrolling in secluded areas in the night, wide, shaded, universally accessible footpaths and safer road crossings along with supporting amenities such as public toilets, seating and spaces for street vendors.