The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : “Optimum utilisation of space during rush hour will solve traffic problems”

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Thursday, Mar 26, 2009
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

“Optimum utilisation of space during rush hour will solve traffic problems”

Staff Reporter

Former Additional Commissioner of Traffic says use of individual vehicles must be discouraged

CHENNAI: The answer to Chennai’s traffic problem lies in optimum utilisation of space during rush hour, a senior police officer said here on Tuesday.

Delivering a lecture for civil engineering students and experts in related fields, Joint Director of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Sunil Kumar, who was previously Additional Commissioner of Traffic, Chennai, suggested freeing up more space on the road during rush traffic hours and discouraging the use of individual vehicles.

Since 1996, the number of vehicles within the city has increased from 8 lakh to 30 lakh, he said. Many households that purchase a second vehicle do so intending to park it on the road. This number has surged particularly because of the increase in call-taxi businesses, he said.

Consequently, 30 per cent of usable road space is filled by parked vehicles, thereby slowing down traffic. Mr. Kumar suggested it be made mandatory that businesses propose an appropriate parking spot at the time of obtaining a commercial vehicle permit. But the issue is not limited to commercial vehicles alone.

“Because several people may live in one household and tracking second vehicle purchases would be difficult, we should use address as the criteria to place a higher tax on the second vehicle purchase than the first.”

Furthermore, he proposed that goods and commercial vehicle drivers should be encouraged to use the roads at night whenever possible, to distribute utilisation of the road throughout the day.

The traffic police have been using reverse-direction procedures to free the flow of traffic during morning and evening rush hour on certain bridges and roads. Redirecting traffic to roads which were not as frequently travelled was the easiest way to make use of space during rush hour, he said.

The Traffic police’s current project is unclogging Anna Salai by directing traffic to Vijayaraghava Road, thereby freeing up the Eldams Road junction on Anna Salai. Still, Mr. Kumar said traffic problems cannot be solved by his agency alone.

“The problems can be solvedbut it may take two, three or five years,” he said. “The traffic police have given government agencies time, but we cannot create infrastructure. We can only suggest solutions from our studies,” he said.

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