Twitter
Advertisement

Delhi: The city of ‘crawlers’

Traffic cops say if 50% of tasks in the 28 corridors, marked as highly-congested are completed, the effect (smooth flow of traffic) will show. DNA dives deep for a real-time assessment of the congestion and de-congestion of the Capital

Latest News
article-main
FacebookTwitterWhatsappLinkedin

A year after identifying 77 corridors and setting up different task forces, Delhi is yet to make a breakthrough. Long hours of being stuck in traffic is still an issue, and being able to de-congest such traffic remains a task. 

Last month, the Supreme Court summoned the Commissioner of Police, Amulya Patnaik, over the delay caused in implementation of the recommendation by the task forces. The court expressed its displeasure over the delay caused to de-congest the traffic in the city and alluding to a famous dialogue of a Sunny Deol-starrer Bollywood flick, ‘tareekh pe tareekh’ (date-after-date) about court proceedings, observed that nothing has happened on the issue even after the 54 meetings between the members of the task forces.

The Delhi Traffic Police officers said that the tasks assigned to them have been completed and some are continuous processes, which are being done on a regular basis.

They also said that while the time lines for the tasks identified have been given to different civic agencies, there isn’t a fixed time line for when Delhi will be traffic-free. Senior traffic officers argued that the increasing number of vehicles pose the biggest challenge. While the number of vehicles is increasing on a daily basis, the width of the road will remain the same, they said.

“There is already so much load on the existing roads and if the number of vehicles keep increasing, then the roads will be taking more load than they already are. Moreover, Delhi does not see traffic from just within the city. Since it connects Noida to Gurgaon and vice versa, the volume of traffic is more, especially during the peak hours,” said a traffic officer.

As per the affidavit submitted by the Delhi Police to the top court, to achieve the target in the highly-congested 28 corridors which fall in the “A” category, 54 meetings have been held by the convener with concerned civic agencies. A total number of 352 tasks, pertaining to the various concerned agencies for bringing about necessary improvement, have been identified.

These tasks primarily pertain to removal of encroachments, change in junction geometric, erection of iron grills on central verges, re-location of electric poles, trees and transformers, creation of U-turn, road widening, renovation of roads, re-designing  of intersections, construction of foot-over bridge, underpasses, subways for pedestrian movement, shifting bus stands, identification of new parking spaces, removal of garbage bins, closure of cuts, road carpeting, provision of road signages and road markings, installation of traffic signals, provision of slip roads, and construction of bus bays.

Eight of these identified tasks, to be executed by the Delhi Police, were taken up, but three were found ‘not feasible’.  

It’s just not the Delhi Police, but seven other civic agencies which are involved in the work. Out of the identified tasks, 46 were found ‘not feasible’ by the implementing agencies for various reasons. At some places, it was not possible to reduce the width of the central verge, there was no possibility of providing a table top at certain locations, there was alos a non-feasibility of installation of a new traffic signal at a location, and no possibility of shifting of a bus stand from a location was also listed, along with not being able to widen a road at certain locations.

Forty five tasks, including underpasses, construction of flyover, widening of roads, multi-model integration at selected Metro stations, installation of iron grills, shifting of DTC bus stops, and repairing of street lights, are under progress by concerned civic agencies. Thirty four tasks, primarily related to removal of encroachment from footpath and roads, are being monitored by the three Municipal Corporations of Delhi and other civic road agencies in their respective areas.

The traffic police have now asked the concerned civic agencies to provide a time frame in which they will complete the work. The Public Works Department (PWD) has been asked to complete 221 tasks, out of which, only 56 have been done. The Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), which was given 60 tasks, has only completed seven of them. On the other hand, 15 tasks were identified, but 12 were found ‘not feasible’ and two tasks are still pending.

Out of the total 352 tasks assigned, so far, only 79 tasks have been completed; 34 are still going on; 46 tasks are ‘not feasible’; 45 are under progress, whereas 148 tasks are pending. The traffic police, which is the convening authority, has now asked the civic agencies to submit a time frame in which they would complete the tasks. The tasks have been undergoing since over a year now. According to the traffic officers, if 50 per cent of the tasks are completed on these 28 corridors, the affect would show on the traffic scenario in the national capital.

The 77 corridors

The Lieutenant-Governor Anil Baijal, in a high-level meeting last year, had asked the Delhi Police and other civic agencies to form a Special Task Force to identify congested points. The task force, which is headed by the Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP), Traffic, also includes members of civic agencies. To handle the issues of congestion at main arterial roads, six task forces, one for each traffic range, were constituted with DCP/Range/Traffic as the Convener to identify bottlenecks leading to traffic jams. They were also asked to prepare a time-bound action plan for a smooth flow of traffic on those roads. The task force comprises of representatives from PWD, MCD (South Delhi Municipal Corporation, East Delhi Municipal Corporation, North Delhi Municipal Corporation), Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC), Delhi Development Authority (DDA), the Transport Department and the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI). 

The task force teams have held meetings with member stake holders and identified 77 congested corridors for traffic improvement in the city. These corridors have been further prioritised in categories ‘A’ (28 corridors), ‘B’ (30 corridors) and ‘C’ (19 corridors). Most vital and congested corridors have been categorised as ‘A’ on the basis of the volume of traffic and the main arterial roads connecting various parts of Delhi to ensure smooth traffic.

STRENGTH OF TRAFFIC COPS IN DELHI

The Delhi Traffic Police has a sanctioned strength of 8,793 officers. However, for a city like the Capital, where there are lakhs of vehicles, the number is way too less. During rainy season, when the showers clog the roads, the need of more traffic officers diverting the traffic is much felt. “Yes, there are many two-wheelers and four-wheelers in Belhi, but the reality is also that not every person riding or driving has a traffic sense. Sometimes, there issues like people driving on the wrong side, jumping red lights, taking a u-turn from the wrong side, getting into fights in the middle of the road. All of these are not traffic issues, but they creat huge traffic snarls. One needs to understand the rules and regulations and move accordingly. It definitely makes our job much easier,” said a traffic officer.

Find your daily dose of news & explainers in your WhatsApp. Stay updated, Stay informed-  Follow DNA on WhatsApp.
Advertisement

Live tv

Advertisement
Advertisement