Microlevel Traffic Management Needed

one observation that we make at junctions is that the tar road will be in a very bad shape in most places/junctions..this, I think, is probably due to heavy braking and poor laying of the road! It is said that concrete roads, though high initial cost of laying, is stable for a long time and does not giveaway like tar..we cannot make all roads in concrete but how about just building intersections with concrete? This will help smooth flow of traffic when it hits the junction!

cant find my original drawing which had left slip lanes and ped crossing design. for now, this image from wiki has to do. it shows left turn lanes for right side traffic(for us it would be right turn lane). the area in red should be concreted.

Mark Tully (retired BBC Correspondent) wrote : “ The great cities of Asia during the end of the 19th century (1900) were Calcutta, Mumbai & Delhi. These cities were the first to have proper drainage systems, piped water supply, electricity, trains & trams for commuters & good roads. However, during the end of the 20th century (2000), the best cities in Asia are Osaka, Singapore & Hong-Kong. Calcutta, Mumbai & Delhi are some of the worst cities in Asia “. Present day Indian Cities are unique in their inefficiency & cannot perhaps be compared with US, Singapore, Hong-Kong, Chinese or even Vietnamese cities. The gigantic population & excessive poverty coupled with a democratic system that gives them freedom to move about, protection under law, subsidies & a voice that can be heard has lead a large section of the populace to low ethical standards & greed. Illegal or unethical acts for personal gain, such as evading taxes, encroachment, protesting for the slightest of inconveniences or costs, bribing officials, building violations, etc. is common & widespread as punishments are either condoned or only for the convicted, which again is a long process that can also be manipulated. Various personnel & staff within the government machinery, taking full advantage of these conditions, has ‘officials’ at every level who will ‘help’ the defaulter for a sum. After all, why should they be left out & stay poor ? In the backdrop of such a loose & flexible system that views petty crime as routine & allows violators to get away unnoticed or without ruffling too many feathers, chaos on our roads follows naturally when there are too many users & is not surprising. The primary reason for chaos on roads in our city, & probably all Indian cities is obviously that these road networks were never planned for the very large volumes of traffic that use them today & therefore have too many intersections. Very slow moving push carts, tractors, scores of two wheelers, very fast moving private cars, commercial vehicles, large private buses & public transport buses all jostle for space on the same road, without any segregation. This excessive mix of vehicles with different priorities & goals for each type of traffic results in very poor efficiency of the overall movement of traffic. Efforts by authorities, such as marking dedicated lanes for auto-rickshaws on some roads have had little impact on streamlining the flow of traffic & conditions continue to deteriorate as several more vehicles are added each day to the traffic. AA) Poor Planning & Lapses by Authorities : 1) No serious efforts are being made to find a solution to fund development & maintenance of road infrastructure within cities. Private sector initiatives, such as BMIC have been caught up in the battle between political parties. Road on stilts along Hosur road to EC has progressed through PPP, but this is mainly due to assured income through tolls as the class of users expected are those that will willingly pay for the convenience. Surprisingly, at the central government level, highway projects (golden quadrilateral, NS & EW corridors) are progressing well, though, through various modes of funding, including private sector & loans from WB & ADB, etc.. Tolled highways have been a success, probably because the condition of these roads were so bad that this alternative, with some cost, has been welcomed since there were no other alternatives. A similar ‘revolution’ may be what is needed to find capital to maintain city roads. 2) Very high unanticipated growth rates have resulted in excessive traffic. Regular & routine investments that were being made thus far are too meager to cope with increases in traffic volumes. Much more is clearly required. Various political parties hesitate to seriously rope in private sector for fear of becoming unpopular since road tolls & other indirect charges would commence. The stalemate continues as road infrastructure deteriorates, unlike in other countries where infrastructure is developed mostly by private sector investment or through loans & recovered from road users through various means. 3) Disincentives for road use are almost non-existent & even parking is not being charged for in many cases. This makes the situation worse than it is as people begin to believe that government property is everybody’s for the taking. 4) Timely interventions, investments or alternatives (such as an efficient Metro system or an efficient Rapid bus system) were never seriously pursued in the past & continue to languish due to the mundane nature of our decision making & financing abilities as also due to poor commitment shown by authorities. Additional vehicle users that may have otherwise used such transit systems now add to the load on the road network. 5) Maintenance work & fault repairing of utilities such as water pipes, electricity, telephone lines & drainage frequently interrupt traffic movements along many roads as these systems are old & are prone to failures – investments to upgrade these utilities have not been enough either. 6) Use of available funds for road infrastructure is inefficient & do not reach areas which require priority or are urgent. 7) Sidewalks, or what's left of them are uneven, too narrow, not continuous & in many cases are unsafe due to obstructions, debris, etc.. As a result, pedestrians spill over & add to the mixture of road users, particularly in congested areas, slowing down movement of traffic. BB) Poor Ethics of the Populace : 8) Poor road manners of vehicle users, such as risky overtaking from the wrong side or trying to overtake with too little room, not allowing enough room for vehicles in the opposite direction (even when stopped at signals), excessive & unwarranted use of horn, all add to the prevailing chaos & slows down traffic further. 9) Improving efficiency of traffic flows by blocking off some of the unnecessary openings along road dividers has not been possible due to protests by locals. This has added to road inefficiencies as volumes eventually grow larger & what starts off as a small obstruction becomes a regular signaled intersection that affects free flow of mainstream traffic. 10) Space on roads & sidewalks is taken up by hawkers & petty shops for their business activities, such as displaying wares & loading /unloading supplies, etc. causing obstructions to free movement of pedestrians & traffic. 11) Many intersections are blocked by parked auto-rickshaws that use them as vantage points to find customers. This again effects traffic movements. Even if they are chased off by a cop, they return to the same spot & enforcement is very difficult as a cop cannot be dedicated for each such spot permanently. 12) On some roads, space is taken up by cattle & stray animals as there are no measures to keep them out of traffic lanes. If restrictions, such as barricades are put in place, they are surreptitiously removed by those affected. 13) Though people, by & large demand improvements, road /fly-over /bridge tolls or other means of funding are hard to enforce within cities as usually, there are protests against such costs as taxi-drivers, auto-rickshaws & many economically poorer groups believe that it should be made available to them freely. 14) All types of litter, wastes & garbage is disposed off by people along the sides of roads which eventually end up in storm drains or gutters that are very difficult to clean & maintain each rainy season. Many remain unclean & result in water-logging of roads that lead to road surface damage & potholes. This affects road safety & traffic movement. Thus, funds have to be diverted to this almost routine activity, which is avoidable. 15) Parking along roadsides, No parking zones & Sidewalks is routine & effects traffic flow, either directly or indirectly. This is a big menace that can only be controlled by reducing the no. of vehicles. Repeated offenders are common. 16) Evasion of traffic fines & property taxes by bribing &/or under valuing of property that drains state finances. 17) Jumping signals & going through red even as other more patient vehicles stand by for the green is now quite frequent. Arguments with traffic cops are routine, even when the cop is doing his duty correctly & questioning the violator. Solutions to reduce chaos on roads seem very hard as discipline is very poor on all sides. BRTS system, though very difficult to implement amidst this confusion, is possibly the only ray of hope. To start with, if a wide road (say, PRR) is planned with BRTS in mind, & with a segregated pair of bus-ways & all necessary infrastructure in place to prevent intrusion by other traffic, & is successfully demonstrated as dependable & for the benefit of all, acceptance of a road system with lanes by general public may be enough to instill some sense of road discipline, but this is easier said than done.

I was in a training on conflict management the other day and the same thought came from it.. our education system only teaches us to be on the competetive edge..crab in a well..'if I am not going up, let others not go up either..eventually it hurts all!

Its a good one Naveen, you should post your list of 17 items as a separate blog item.