It’s time to put brakes on rising road accidents

Underpasses, flyovers may curtail casualties

Sandeep Rana

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, July 19

Even after engineering changes being done at most accident-prone areas, including three black spots, there is no stopping road accidents, making the UT Traffic Police to write to the administration to build underpasses and flyovers in the City Beautiful.

Sources in the police said at three black spots - Transport Light point, Sector 45/46/49/50 light point and Hallo Majra light point - where most fatal and grievous injury mishaps are reported, it has been recommended to build underpasses or flyovers.

Measures like change in traffic light timings, signboards and installing cat eye were recommended to the UT Engineering Department and the Municipal Corporation at these dangerous spots. Though these changes were partially done and the number of accidents slightly declined, innocent lives continue to be snuffed out at these places.

“A flyover is being planned at the Tribune Chowk. It will help do away with the problem of traffic jam and accidents in Hallo Majra as well. While at spots like the Sectors 45/46/49/50 light point, we have recommended underpasses,” said a police official.

As per the data available with the Chandigarh Traffic Police, a total of 176 accidents took place from January 1 to June 30 this year. In these mishaps, 61 persons lost their lives, while 141 suffered injuries. In the corresponding period in 2016, 216 accidents were reported. In this, 75 people died while 160 persons got injured. In 2015, 146 accidents took place, in which 129 people died and 331 sustained injuries.

On this, Superintendent of Police (SP Traffic) Ravi Kumar said: “Road fatalities have come down due to joint effort of all. We have identified 21 points such as Kisan Chowk, Matka Chowk and Tribune Chowk where we manually manage traffic in the evening and morning hours. We also do targeted challaning among other measures. We had made several recommendations to the engineering department at accidents spots and work is being done in that regard.”

Harman Singh Sidhu, president, Arrive Safe, an NGO working on road safety, said: “Identification of black spots is fine but it is a continuous exercise as they keep changing. Also, during investigation of accident sites, along with the police, engineering department officials should also be there to find the cause. Focus should also be there at traffic violations during late-night hours to curb accidents.”