Children too fed up with bad roads

Children too fed up with bad roads
Say Traffic Jams Due To Too Few Cops,Too Many Vehicles
The Times of India

Bangalore: Forget techie czars, even children are fed up of bumpy rides on city’s bad roads and traffic chaos.

They say the main reason for traffic jams and accidents is bad roads. Also too few cops and too many private vehicles are to be blamed. Worse, it takes long to travel from one place to another, specially when important people visit the city. As for BMTC, they say buses are not people-friendly, they don’t stop in bus bays and drivers are rash.

These were among the findings of a Children’s Investigation Report on Traffic and Road Safety involving 2,000 students from 50 civic clubs in schools across the city. The survey, conducted during October-November, covered nearly 3,000 households in the city on issues ranging from condition of roads, public transport to use of helmets.

While presenting the report, initiated by Children’s Movement for Civic Awareness (CMCA), to police commissioner Ajai Kumar Singh on Friday, the children also highlighted issues of lack of parking space, traffic management and infrastructure.

While an overwhelming percentage (88%) of respondents said their health was affected because of traffic, 92 per cent felt that helmets should be made compulsory for riders and pillion.

As part of the survey, the children interacted with various civic authorities including the Bangalore Mahanagara Palike, Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation, Bangalore Development Authority, and Auto Drivers Unions and several corporates.

CMCA, a joint initiative of Public Affairs Centre and Swabhimana, chose traffic and road safety as its theme for this year. Environment and education are among other issues CMCA has covered in the past, a CMCA volunteer said.
Lauding the children’s effort, Ajai Kumar Singh said, road safety education programmes will be taken up seriously. While the police department has already accepted a few proposals, the project will be outsourced and efforts are on to involve some big companies too, he added.

Reiterating the need for better road and traffic conditions, transport commissioner Om Prakash said the unprecedented increase in vehicles compounded with lack of manpower has posed a problem. He said there were no laws in India to regulate registration of new vehicles and also said they had urged the Centre to make amendments with regard to driving rules.

Children learnt ...

•There are 3,300 buses, 28,000 vehicles are registered every month, 1,800 traffic constables, 600 driving licenses are issued every day, 6.5 lakh vehicles were fined in five months, 900 death and 7,000 injuries reported in 2004.

• Need for core ring road, area traffic control system, head injuries should be treated immediately; 43 per cent of victims killed in road accidents were two-wheeler riders.

THEY PLEAD

•Most footpaths are in bad shape, improve them to make it safe for users.
• Improve roads for a safer and smoother ride.
• Punish offenders severely and force them to follow traffic rules.
• Make wearing of helmets compulsory to safeguard our families.
• No serious efforts to educate the ‘adult’ public.

NVESTIGATION

• 2,000 children from 50 civic clubs took part.
• Questionnaire comprised 30 questions.
• Awareness leaflet distributed to each of 3,000 households that were covered.
• An Investigation Brigade of 43 students did a study to complement the CMCA members’ findings and interact with authorities.

FINDINGS

• 71 per cent comprised two-wheelers, 34 per cent cars.
• Out of 2,776 persons questioned, 81 per cent either drive or ride a vehicle. Of 2,168 persons, only 52 per cent obtained licence from RTO without bribe.
• Main reasons for traffic jams: Bad roads 73%, too many private vehicles 56%, violations 45%, too few policemen 22%.
•To obey traffic rules educate public 63%, increase penalty 41%, train BMTC drivers 37%, imprison violators 22%.
• Why accidents? Bad roads 78%, overspeeding 76%, violations 53%, BMTC bus drivers 31%, lack of footpaths/pedestrian crossings 30%.
• Pedestrian safety: 51% say Bangalore is not pedestrian-friendly because of motorists’ attitude. accidents will reduce with usable footpaths 56%, awareness 42%, signals 41%.
• Helmets: 55% said both rider and pillion should wear helmet.

What they say
Police: Increase in vehicles. BMP: Roads are damaged because other departments dig up stretches.
Transport Department:
Impossible to regulate registration of new vehicles. BMTC: Denies that its accident and traffic violation rates are high. BDA: No comment on lack of vision in planning for growth of city.
Auto Drivers Association: Forced to overload by parents. Corporates: Please train drivers.