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| Traffic awareness: Life thrown out of gear | | Good spirited but ill conceived initiative holds life on roads to ransom as cops taught rules | | Early Times Reporter
Jammu | Feb 25
Reminded of their duty, the men in blue today collaborated with Big FM radio channel to create traffic awareness in the town and it turned out to be an unbelievable ‘big chaos’ on the roads virtually throwing life out of gear, particularly on the vital link between the old and the new city.
An ill conceived idea indeed, the traffic awareness initiative, which though deserves appreciations for its spirit, had city in mess for most of the day. Driving from one end of the flyover to the other end took, at most of the times in the day, 30 to 45 minutes which normally should have taken not more than two minutes. Such was the impact of traffic awareness initiative that vehicles were seen queuing from Satwari chowk to Manda and the deafening sound of horns rented the air making life difficult for the day.
The traffic cops and their associates were perhaps little aware of the fact that it is not the ‘ceremonial awareness initiative’ which is going to improve the traffic system on city roads but needs major policy initiatives to make the roads worth driving and enjoying.
Traffic management in Jammu is today one of the most serious challenges which needs more efforts of decongestion than the awareness initiatives. Awareness campaigns, though good to sensitize people on driving skills and cautions on roads, can not change the situation which perennial in nature and needs major policy decisions.
One of the main factors which make life difficult on city roads is the fact that number of vehicles is increasing in an unprecedented manner while there is no corresponding increase in the road length. Jammu city in particular and the district in general perhaps has the highest density of vehicles as compared to other states and many other regions of the country. Jammu district counts for 327718 registered vehicles which is 57 per cent of the total vehicles registered across Jammu and Kashmir. One can conveniently add another 80,000 to one lakh vehicle in addition to the registered vehicles present in Jammu. These vehicles either come from other districts or other states during their trips to the town.
There are at least 10582 vehicles in per square kilometer area of Jammu and a staggering figure of 17 per cent of the total population owns vehicles in Jammu. Therefore, this is a phenomenal increase in the number of vehicles with no corresponding increase in the road length which makes traffic scenario worst in Jammu.
Adding insult to the injury, the disciplining efforts of the traffic department by erecting cones and barricades on the roads contribute to frequent and long traffic jams which are a common scene in the city. Nearly 2000 of plastic conical dividers are still seen scattered on the roads, causing more havoc than checking the traffic violations.
The traffic department had claimed to have provided interim relief to the vehicular traffic on congested roads but the commuters are of the view that the frequent jams are due to dividers lying on the left or right side of the road, forcing the drivers to test their driving skills.
Who is to be blamed, as both sides blame each other? While drivers claim that the traffic department needs to take care of these, whether these are placed at the right place or not, while on the other hand the traffic department blames ‘insensitive drivers’, who deliberately drag these into the middle. Whatever may be the reason, public property is getting wasted.
Another potential hazard on roads is the unruly ride of the mini bus operators. The mini bus operators are making an open mockery of the entire exercise and wait for overloading at these places. There is no one to penalise them for this wanton act, sources said. It takes at least an hour to cover a distance of over six to eight kilometres, whether it is Trikuta Nagar or Shastri Nagar or barely four kilometres to Bakshi Nagar, courtesy the nexus between traffic police and operators who hardly care for the common public.
The senior traffic officials, however, claim that departments like roads and buildings, Jammu municipal corporation, Jammu development authority, regional transport authority and transport department are not equally coordinating for smooth regulation of traffic.
The lack of parking place in Old City area also aggravates the problem especially in Kanak Mandi and Purani Mandi, where no traffic personnel are seen. The department simply sheds away its responsibility saying “acute shortage of man power.”
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