Are We in a Traffic Mess ?

Tarun Nongthombam *

Traffic is a subject which we all have some opinion and this makes it a double edge sword. It is good to have our own views and express but it becomes more of an irritant to the people who work with traffic when all start commenting. Imphal traffic police have been attracting lot of bad press lately because of making pedestrian only in the market areas. Are we jumping the gun by criticizing? Don't you feel obliged to know what happens in other cities of India and how a new scheme is implemented before we criticize?

Present pedestrian only scheme is a big major shake-up in the market area after the huge shifting of keithel imas to the newly built buildings. A scheme of this magnitude should preferably have started with a study of the feasibility of the scheme, examination of alternatives as it happens in many Indian cities. Not all traffic schemes start with a study, many are done by the traffic police themselves with success but complexities involved here demand a study. But one should never underestimate the traffic police, many of them are smart people who have worked for decades and they know the city traffic and its problem more than any of us.

Study cost money, as you have to hire experts in this field. It can be initiated by the government bodies like Imphal Municipality, PDA, Transport Department or even by the Traffic Police themselves. Couples of years back, now it could be costing much more, a comprehensive traffic plan study for the Pune city cost about 20 lakhs, a study of Delhi and National Capital Region cost more than a crore. But, actual implementation of traffic schemes recommended by the study could cost many times more and make a dig at state exchequer's pocket.

Good thing about conducting a study is that nowadays-public consultation has become a part of it. We already have seen shop owners protesting because of the reduced sales due to banning of vehicles. Other interesting things have thrown up, which could have been avoided with a proper consultation with the affected citizens. People living the bazaar areas have no knowledge of how their own vehicles can be used inside the market. Others have expressed fears about coming out of the bank and the distance one has to walk with the money to the parking.

Hiring experts could have prevented the bad press, the traffic jams pubic suffered during those trial runs and helped in getting a more implement able scheme. It is well known among the traffic experts that any new traffic scheme takes some time to stabilize. Trial runs should start from the lean hours and move slowly towards the peak hours, which is generally office going and returning hours. One should never start trial runs during peak hours and this is the mistake Imphal traffic police made and attracted lot of bad press. Another trick lies in locating parking areas near the market so that people don't have to walk long distance.

People in hills have often criticized that development is only concentrated in Imphal. Even in Imphal it is only in Municipal areas where one can see development and related traffic problems. You can do a test by yourself. See the stark decrease in traffic when you cross Airport and move few kilometer towards Bishnupur, this is same beyond chingmeirong. This shows the pattern of development even in Imphal areas!

I feel Imphal lost a big chance of reducing congestion when New Assembly location was chosen in chingmeirong. Assembly building could have been shifted to Imphal East in Porompat or in Patsoi or Lamsang. This would have been followed by number of offices and other services in the new location and we could have had another satellite town coming up besides the municipal Imphal. I am not aware why chingmeirong was chosen as the location but possible reason could be easy availability of government land with no headache of land acquisition, better sense of security, being near to the Imphal center or it could be just complete lack of vision by our political leaders.

Let me mention a case where security dictated the planning. Provision of high structure like flyover near the Rajghat in Delhi is prohibited even if it results in reducing the traffic chaos. Delhi police feels it would make easy for the terrorist to take pot-shot at the visiting dignitaries at Rajghat.

Cities generally have new and old area. Planning and traffic management in old part of a city is always difficult. In old Delhi areas, there are road junctions where the authorities are scared to touch and suggest measures for improvement even if there are massive delays due to heavy traffic. Present Imphal khwairamband and adjoining places, which is Imphal city old area, will be not easy to deal with.

To solve Imphal city planning and traffic mess, it will require a joint effort of experts, traffic police, political backing with overall support from the citizens. One good thing is, our traffic police have taken an initiative to solve the traffic problem unlike other Manipur Government departments which looks the other way and always seem to have DO NOTHING attitude.