Travelling on certain arterial stretches in the city has become an ordeal especially during peak hours, thanks to the one-ways, traffic diversions and narrowing down of roads for ongoing Chennai Metro Rail Limited (CMRL) work.

During the rush hours in the morning and evening, the city’s traffic moves at snail’s pace. The honking of vehicles and the wail of ambulances that struggle to find a way through hordes of motorists, on some stretches, resonate for a long time.

Though the Chennai traffic police claim to have made arrangements, including one-way routes and traffic diversions, to ease vehicle movement, residents feel the measures are inadequate. “For travelling a few hundred meters, we take a detour of four kilometres. Every resident of Anna Nagar and Kilpauk has harrowing experiences,” said S. Arvind, a medical representative and resident of Anna Nagar.

V. Nagasundaram, secretary of Anna Nagar Welfare Association, says the locality lacks pedestrian crossing, traffic signals and traffic personnel at the main junctions. Shanthi Colony Main Road and Thirteenth Main Road present a classic example. “Crossing the roads is a nightmare, especially for senior citizens and children, because of one-ways,” he said. Moreover, the construction of a flyover near Thirumangalam junction has thrown traffic off gear.

The problem is not particular to Anna Nagar. Traffic policemen on Poonamallee High Road, too, complain that the problem gets aggravated during peak hours, especially near Chennai Central Railway station and Kilpauk Medical College. “There has been an increase in awareness to pave way for ambulances. Otherwise, it would have been difficult for the vehicles to get to the hospitals on time,” said a policeman.

Another location where traffic is chaotic is Broadway as the road has become narrow. “The presence of the market worsens the situation. It is becoming increasingly difficult to enter Madras High Court,” said V.S. Suresh, an advocate.

Traffic experts feel that a lot needs to be done for traffic management in Chennai. In Delhi, during the CMRL construction, though there were disruptions, an efficient traffic management plan helped ease congestion in some areas, said Rohit Baluja, president of Indian Road Traffic Education.

“In Chennai, they should have good lane management that would make transit between lanes well tapered and seamless. For instance, they could put the two- and three-wheelers in one lane and the four-wheelers in the other,” he said.

Establishing traffic engineering centres and training people is crucial to conducting surveys and providing better solutions for traffic congestion,he added.

Meanwhile, officials of Chennai Metro Rail Limited said they intimate the traffic police about any change in their work one month in advance. “They then work out routes for diversions on the concerned road. In some areas, we employ more than two workers to control traffic,” an official said.

Source: The Hindu

A state-of-the-art system, similar to the Traffic Management Centre, is to be set up at the Police Commissioner’s office

Pertinently widening of Jammu-Udhampur road is part of the National Highway Authority of India’s (NHAI’s) flagship project of four-laning of Jammu-Srinagar Highway.

“In view of ongoing work, it takes three to four hours to reach Jammu from Udhampur,” said a commuter.

The situation is worst from Tirkri to Jajjarkotly as many stretches along the road have been reduced to a single lane.

The NHAI has divided the Jammu-Srinagar Highway four-laning project into six sub-projects,  including Jammu-Udhampur road (65 kms),  construction of Chenani-Nashri tunnel (12 kms), Udhampur- Ramban  road (43 kms)  Ramban –Banihal  road (36 kms), Banihal- Qazigund- road (15.25 kms) and Qazigund – Srinagar road (67.7 kms).

The widening work along the Udhampur-Jammu road stretch includes four tunnels besides equal number of flyovers and bridges. The longest tunnel is of 540 meters length while others three are of 330 meters, 300 meters and 210 meters. The NHAI has fixed May 2016 as deadline for completion of the project.

Overcrowding of roads by private vehicles and parking problems have prompted the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) to undertake a survey of parking trends on main city roads.

The city has been facing serious traffic problems owing to inefficient public transport system, forcing citizens to use private vehicles.

“The civic administration will carry out a survey of parking trends on main city roads. This data will help us solve various traffic and parking-related problems,” said Additional City Engineer Srinivas Bonala.

The survey would be carried out through a private agency, which will gather information on vehicles parked every hour during peak hours from 8 am to noon and 6 pm to 10 pm. The agency will also have to provide details of parking space on city roads. “Once the data is compiled, it will be easier to analyse the number of private vehicles on city roads. It will also help find whether there is sufficient parking space available on main roads,” said a civic officer.

He said the data will help the civic administration in framing a policy to address the traffic and parking issue.

MKCL to undertake online recruitment of civic employees

The Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) standing committee on Wednesday approved the proposal seeking appointment of Maharashtra Knowledge Corporation Ltd (MKCL) to implement the online recruitment for the civic body. The civic administration had proposed that MKCL be allowed to carry out the recruitment of civic staff through its special online service. “The committee members felt the civic body should allow MKCL to operate for six months and assess their performance,” said Vishal Tambe, Chairperson, Standing Committee. He said MKCL will not carry out the recruitment Class I officers. As per the requirement, the civic body will float tenders after six months.

source – http://www.indianexpress.com

“Mobility in medium and big cities is a huge challenge due to congestion during peak hours, which is mainly due to excessive use of private vehicles. There is a need to resolve the congestion issues urgently for improving mobility of people,” secretary of the Union ministry of urban development, Sudhir Krishna, stated in a letter addressed to all chief secretaries.

‘Excessive use of private vehicles’ on limited road space available is inefficient use of precious urban land. There is a need to discourage the use of private vehicles in select core areas of the city to increase the mobility of people at large, so that they can reach their workplaces, business centres and shops in time, without losing valuable working man hours, Krishna said in his letter. The congestion charge is premised on a basic concept – “charge a price in order to allocate a scarce resource to its most valuable use”. However, before introducing the congestion charge, the pre-condition is that there should be a good public transport system in place in the concerned city and proper facilities for pedestrians and cyclists, Krishna said.

The ministry has also cited case studies of congestion charging in central London and Singapore. “There are several cities the world over where congestion charges in one form or the other area being charged from private vehicles for many years. It is desirable to study the congestion pricing system in these cities in detail, and devise our own method. The results of congestion pricing in foreign cities have been impressive. Traffic in central London went down by about 21% and traffic speeds went up by about 10%,” Krishna wrote.

Municipal commissioner Mahesh Pathak wasn’t convinced with the road congestion tax suggestion for Pune. “It would be very difficult to implement. There are multiple entry or exit points. Moreover, there is no city in the country where such a tax is being collected,” said Pathak.

Senior traffic officials say such a tax should be ideally implemented, since it will help reduce traffic congestion. However, it is for the municipal corporation to decide on levying such a tax, the traffic officials said.

PMC and traffic police proposals on congestion tax

** In August 2007, the then municipal commissioner Pravinsinh Pardeshi had floated the idea of levying a new vehicle tax to arrest the growth of vehicular traffic. The proposed tax was proposed in addition to the registration charges and taxes paid to the Regional Transport Office, and if implemented, it would have been calculated based on the number of vehicles owned by a family. “We need to discourage the number of personal vehicles in the city, which are growing at an alarming speed,” he had said. The proposal did not work out, with staunch political opposition.

** The Pune traffic police in November 2009 sent a proposal to levy congestion charges on some of the busy city roads passing through the central peth areas of the city for reducing traffic. Besides proposing congestion charges, the traffic police had also stressed on the need to ban four-wheelers and two-wheelers on some busy roads, and turn them into walkways for citizens. The proposal also said that heavy parking charges should be collected from vehicle owners in the congested areas

Source- http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com