Noisy and ungainly, India’s three-wheeled auto rickshaws are an iconic form of urban transport that can be hard to love. But rickshaws account for 20 percent of motorized trips in some Indian cities, provide jobs to tens of thousands of drivers, are inexpensive to buy and operate, and provide an elegant (if rickety) solution to the problem of affordable, short-distance transportation.
So the question is how tuk-tuks (as auto rickshaws are called because of their distinctive engine noise) can work more reliably. Fortunately, there’s an app for that.
Traditionally, auto rickshaws’ flaws have stemmed from low usage rates, an inability to identify supply and demand in real time and inefficient pricing that made nobody happy. In recent years, however, technically adept businesses have leveraged India’s 1 billion (and counting) mobile phones to develop rickshaw hail apps.
Rickshaws that previously meandered along disjointed routes with no connection to their customers’ needs now run on optimized routes, leading to improved service and greater road safety. Drivers have doubled or tripled the number of rides they’re able to complete in a day, which has made them willing to accept the fare on the meter rather than haggle with the customer over the price.
In Mumbai, for example, the Autorickshaw and Taximen’s Union recently launched OnGo, an app allowing cashless payments for rides. And Uber recently shifted its focus away from its Indian auto rickshaw operation, shutting down in the face of homegrown competitors that are fostering closer relationships with drivers.
The rickshaw revolution shows how existing solutions can be improved without major disruption. In the “global south,” where most of the world’s poor live, solutions tend to be hyperlocal, with an extremely low profit margin.
In the rickshaw revolution, two groups with different kinds of knowledge have come together: people who understand the genesis and development of local solutions, especially for those living at society’s margins, and people who can marshal the best technology, whatever its source. Enormous value can be captured by innovation that is more tinkering and crafting than game-changing.
Ani Dasgupta is the global director of the WRI Ross Center for Sustainable Cities.