The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has decided to ease its online booking system at the elevated nature trail at Malabar Hill to keep up with the spot’s growing popularity.
It is pertinent to note that this comes at a time when the footfall has been decreasing despite availability of slots, which goes underutilised due to mandatory prior booking.
Currently, tourists can visit the spot by booking an hour-long slot through the BMC website. The number of visitors allowed during any one-hour slot is capped at 200. Most slots, especially for weekends, must be booked at least a week in advance.
However, a new WhatsApp number will soon be introduced to facilitate on-the-spot bookings. Additionally, the one-hour time slots will be revised, allowing citizens to book shorter 15-minute or 30-minute visits. An official also mentioned that a chatbot is likely to be developed as part of this project.
The BMC has observed a decline in visitor numbers, from approximately 55,000 in May to 45,000 in June. Therefore, they realised an upgrade is necessary to allow bookings in shorter durations. A civic official stated that on-the-spot bookings could even be allowed in 5-minute windows. The BMC is working on backend changes to make this possible for citizens.
Mumbai's first ever forest walkway, which was inaugurated in March this year, garnered 1 lakh visitors in April.