Jammed Junctions: Wrap up

Jammed Junction

USERS VIEW

Limit private cars, make public transport user-friendly

Under the Jammed Junction column, Deccan Herald identified nine major junctions and highlighted the problems, faced by people who used these roads, caused by unscientific ways of manning traffic. The column also suggested ways of overcoming these problems.

Here we present some of the suggestions given by our readers to make things less miserable on main roads in the City.

Singapore example
The growing number of vehicles on Bangalore roads has become a serious cause for concern and needs careful thought and action. We should try and follow examples from other countries like Singapore, where the cost of owning cars and paying more tax dents a consumer's enthusiasm in buying cars.

Public transport is made user-friendly and inexpensive, thereby reducing traffic congestion on roads. Schools also follow different timing by having morning and afternoon batches, unlike in India, where morning traffic snarls cause enormous chaos on the roads.

Community living should be encouraged with offices, schools, shops and services located within walkable distances. This reduces vehicle travel, reduces pollution and results in less traffic. People should choose their residence close to their offices to avoid commuting for long hours.

A 'congestion charge' should be collected around main areas like MG Road, KG Road, JC Road, Shivaji Nagar and other prime locations during peak hours.
Besides, there should be clear-cut limits on the use of private cars in choked areas. Roads should be well-maintained and free of potholes for smooth flow of traffic. For short distance travel, the public should be encouraged to walk or go cycling instead of 'cold-starting' their vehicles which is highly polluting. Moreover, flyovers also help in clearing congestion at junctions. Last but not the least, public should follow lane discipline and adhere to traffic rules.
They should have some respect for each other and not scream at each other at the slightest provocation!
Sangeetha Hariharan

To ease traffic snarls
With reference to your series — Jammed Junction focussing on Malleswaram circle — I would like to suggest that the one-way system being followed on Sampige Road and Margosa Road at present be reversed.

This action would considerably ease traffic congestion at the three nodal points namely, the junction at the beginning of Margosa Road near the temple, the junction at the end of Margosa Road near Malleswaram Police Station and at the V Cross-Sampige Road junction.

With this arrangement, vehicles coming from Sampige Road from Mill Corner will turn left at V Cross, then right on Margosa Road and continue unhindered till they reach the junction at Indian Institute of Science (IISc). Likewise, vehicles coming from IISc can continue unhindered till the beginning of Sampige Road and can go up to Gitanjali Circle without trouble.

In the present system, these three junctions slow down the movement of vehicles as there is unnecessary criss crossing traffic. I request the authorities to examine the suggestion.
T N Vaidyanathapura

Unidirectional roads
Traffic management for the police means just one thing. Making all the roads unidirectional! Every board and every traffic signal helps increase their maamool! However, what is important is the comparison of results of any project with the objective. Has the one-way system improved traffic? The answer is a resounding "NO!" So the best solution would be to revert to the old system for one month and actually measure the time taken for travel on the particular road.
One could use a test vehicle to travel and note down in great detail the travel time for any route, for example, from Jayanagar to Yeshwanthpur and back under the present one-way system for one week at different times of the day.

A "tachograph" that records vehicle speed, engine revolutions per minute (rpm) and time on a circular graph could be used for this purpose. The graph will record the actual time spent in travel, in waiting at the traffic lights as also the vehicle speed at every instant throughout the journey.

Let us cancel all "no entry"/ "one-way" /"no free left turn" rules and switch off all the traffic lights. Let us have some temporary circular traffic islands (flower pots will do).The test vehicle should travel for a week on the same pattern and record the details. This can be repeated for two more weeks to gather additional data. The result will surely prove that one-way is certainly the cause of the traffic problems.

Despite the fact that traffic is free to flow in both the directions, time taken is likely to be less than that taken on a unidirectional route. A bonus is that the distance travelled is the same in both directions. It is more difficult to cross a unidirectional road than one that has two-way traffic! However, police and the "experts " will NOT allow this experiment for obvious reasons.

Fuel consumption and pollution will also reduce, in fact traffic through Cubbon Park will come down so much that the park will grow green again. Most of your readers think flyover is the answer for traffic congestion. While the flyover carries a small number of vehicles it forces the others (at least 3 times the ones on the flyover) on the roads to opt for a longer route.

It is also a well established fact that flyovers slaughtered many trees and added tons of concrete, resulting in increased pollution. This, in turn, caused water to evaporate faster, creating dry reservoirs and low water tables. The reservoirs will be dry again by January 2005 and our “experts” and politicians will conduct the usual drill!

With regard to public transport, I would like to inform that if one travels by BMTC bus to, say, JC Road, MTR, Lido or Mysore Bank, one has to to walk almost a km distance to get into a return bus. Before the one-way system was introduced, the bus stopped on both sides of the road and all one needed to do was to cross the road. But BMTC buses are used by the "locals"! And locals have no voice! Infotech people "take a walk" and "walk their dog" while the locals are expected to walk!
Narayan

Vehicles population
I am writing this with regard to the laxity in infrastructure and the unprecedented increase in two-wheeler traffic and in the number of new vehicles in Bangalore City.

There were days when we could count the heads in these areas but now we can just catch a glimpse of vehicles which move at great speeds. Flyovers are welcome but these flyovers need to be linked to say the junctions at Corporation and other connecting routes. The other solution is to follow stagger timing in offices.
Madan M Rao