Date:13/09/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/09/13/stories/2008091360360300.htm

Tamil Nadu

Focus on traffic management Law & order

The city police have plans to handle future growth of traffic, writes
V.S. Palaniappan

With the city witnessing a burgeoning population of people and motor vehicles, traffic management is turning out to be a challenging task than ever before.

The city police have mooted proposals to handle the future growth in vehicular traffic.

City Police Commissioner K.C. Mahali said that a detailed planning of the present problems and future needs in city traffic had been done by a team of experts led by Deputy Commissioner of Police (Crime and Traffic), K. Thondiraj and Assistant Commissioner of Police (Traffic), K. Rajendran.

The most ambitious one among the proposals was introducing a system wherein a person/motorist could just send an SMS to the police control room on accidents and traffic snarls. The control room would send the nearest available police vehicle or a sergeant to ensure the free flow of traffic. The proposal had been sent to the Government and would be in place soon, Mr.Mahali said.

Another plan was to introduce lane discipline from Avanashi Road flyover to the Airport junction. Once the widening work on Avanashi Road was completed and lane system introduced, the police would have all the signals on the stretch synchronised so that vehicles moving at the restricted speed limit could cross all the signals at one go.

Similarly, five places were identified for introducing zebra crossing. It had already been introduced at Ramanathapuram, CMC Hospital and Railway Station.

Rubber paint for the same had been procured and works would begin immediately after the rainy season.

The city at present had 37 automatic traffic signals and efforts were on streamline their functioning.

A proposal had been sent to the Government for introducing 31 more signals.

The locations of the traffic signals proposed included Podanur Pirivu – Pollachi Road junction, DB Road – East Arokiasamy Road junction, Palakkad Road – Kovaipudur Road junction, Avanashi Road – Pioneer Mill Road, Avanashi Road – Kamarajar Road junction, Mettupalayam Road – Sanganoor Road junction, Sathyamangalam Road – Athipalayam Road pirivu junction, Sathyamangalam Road – No 3 Bus Stand at Ganapathy, Sathyamangalam Road – Avarampalayam Road junction, 100 Feet Road – Power House junction, Town Hall – Five Corner junction, Lanka Corner junction, Classic Tower junction on Tiruchi Road and Sungam round-about.