Delhi Traffic Police’s initiative to curb pedestrian fatalities by erecting high railing on the road dividers has bore good results. The police claimed to have reduced pedestrian deaths on the busy road no 56 from Ghazipur to Seemapuri Border by putting high railing. No death has been reported on this stretch so far as compared to five deaths during same period of the previous year.
Police said high railing helped in curbing jaywalking on this stretch that eventually saves pedestrian lives.
According to the officials, keeping in view the increasing number of pedestrian deaths in the city they had decided to increase the height of the railing from 4 .5 metres to 6.5 metres on all roads. The decision has been taken after it was seen that encroachers mostly occupied the footpaths and absence of crossovers at mid junction resulted in most of the pedestrian accidents. As a first step, the high railing were erected on road number 56 on Ghazipur-Seemapuri border. Since then, there have been no pedestrian deaths in that particular region.
In 2012, five pedestrian deaths were reported on this stretch. Additional Commissioner of Police (Traffic) Anil Shukla said pedestrians' safety was the idea behind installing high railing and soon it will be put in place all across the city in a phased manner.
According to the traffic police, unavailability of footpaths and proper crossover facilities primarily led to the accidents. Plans are underway to increase the height of railing at laxmi Nagar, Tilak Marg, Punjabi Bagh, ITO and Vikas Marg.
Officials of the Traffic department said that in New Delhi district, there are around 66 roads and in most of the roads either the railing has been defunct or they are yet to be erected.
However, for smooth regulation of traffic, the department is planning to inspect all roads with the PWD department and identify such stretches where railing or pedestrian markings are required, which is another problem that has come to the fore.