Rush hour on Residency Road

Rush hour on Residency Road
Bengaluru,


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On a stretch less than a kilometre on Residency Road, there are half a dozen major schools, and some 12,000 school children rush out of these schools into waiting cars and school and city buses at about the same time every day
Result: A traffic jam between 2 pm and 3.30 pm on one of Bengaluru’s widest roads, every week day. Worse still, it snowballs into traffic chaos across the city’s central business district (CBD), according to a recent survey carried out by the traffic police
According to Ashok Nagar Traffic inspector Geetha Kulkarni, who led the survey, it has helped the police initiate measures to improve the flow of traffic on Residency Road and its surroundings
The survey basically revealed that the traffic issue can be resolved with active cooperation from the schools and parents
“During the survey, we found that apart from the
cars, school buses and other vehicles, BMTC buses conduct close to 1,000 trips traversing via Residency Road in those 90 minutes between 2 pm and 3.30 pm”, Kulkarni told Deccan Chronicle, “What’s shocking, howev
er, is that cars sent ou to pick up individ ual students take up all the space, parking them selves on not one, but two, even three lanes outside the schools, blocking the flow of traffic”
Now, police have started to restrict car parking to a single lane on the left on Residency Road and to penalise car owners or drivers that park their vehicles outside that lane in second and third lanes
Ashok Nagar police is stationing a special team out
business tral district. That’s why we are giving priority to clearing cars parked in ‘no parking’ zones,” the officer said
Police also held interactions with school managements and parents and have collected suggestions, but
side the schools during closing hours to ensure smooth flow of traffic
“If we can keep the road free of parked vehicles, half the problem due to school traffic will be solved in the
centhe officer ruled out the possibility of changing school timings or restricting the movement of traffic during school hours
But cars are not the only problem. School buses – dozens of them – are equally problematic
In fact, it is estimated that
almost half the students of all the six schools go home on a school or Given that these schools are so close by each other, doesn’t it make sense for them to start a whole new trend — buspooling — among city bus

themselves so as to reduce the number of buses required to bring their students to school altogether? That would be a big step — indeed a first of its kind initiative — in reducing traffic congestion in the central business district
But schools could also effect significant savings, by using fewer buses each, on fuel, drivers’ salaries or contract payments, etc

Efforts are being made to involve NGOs and schools to initiate car-pool- ing and bus-pooling at the school level to reduce congestion outside schools. If schools come out with their own ideas for vehicle-pooling, the police will provide them all support
Addiotional Commissioner of Police (traffic) Pravin Sood
It’s high time we created school-specific traffic modules to ease the burden on roads. Most schools use their transport arrangements as yet another channel for making profits, forcing parents to depend on their own vehicles to take children to and from school
Retired block education officer Ramesh S. Rao
The survey that we conducted recently in the central business district has helped us initiate moves to solve the Residency Road parking problem. About 10,000 vehicles travel on Residency Road between 2 pm and 3.30 pm. Strict enforcement will continue to keep traffic moving smoothly
Geeta Kulkarni Traffic inspector, Ashok Nagar