When it comes to traffic congestion, almost everyone jumps into the discussion and would like to furnish a piece of advice to Government authorities, especially RTO and Municipalities in order to ease the traffic congestion. Hats off to the ex-Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar who took fast decisions to construct a parallel bridge to the old Patto bridge during the mega event of IFFI in 2004 and got it completed in record time. The traffic congestion was solved to some extent.
One can simply imaging what would have been the condition of traffic in the absence of the new bridge near Santa Monica jetty. Similarly, a new bypass road NH4A was constructed by the ex-Chief Minister in a record time of 75 days connecting Panjim to Old Goa before the exposition of sacred relics of St. Francis Xavier. After taking over the reins of the State of Goa in 2012, Parrikar had announced ‘hop in and hop off’ bus service in the city of Panjim on an experimental basis. If that had proved to be a success he was supposed to introduce the same bus service in other cities of Goa. But somehow, it could not materialize as he was tied up with the mining issue.
After Manoharji became the defence minister of the country, Siddharth, the MLA Panjim constituency has expressed his willingness and has promised that the two issues will be on his priority list — first decongesting Panjim city and the garbage issue. The proposed flyover from Porvorim to Merces junction will definitely prove to be a boon for Goans and others as the vehicles heading to Margao, Vasco, Ponda, Belgaum, etc., will be able to avoid traffic jam near Panjim circle. Rs. 100 crores are being spent on the widening of the road from Merces traffic circle to Old Goa. The proposed six lane road will be an unique and first of its kind in Goa once it is completed. The work on this road is in full swing even though the residents in this area are facing a nightmare because of the dust and sound as the authorities and particularly the contractors are doing little to control the pollution. The following points have to be taken into consideration:
1) The roads are often dug up by PWD or Electricity department or Municipality for various reasons and the commuters and other road users have to suffer for months till it is brought to original state. When the roads are dug, the breadth of the road is reduced which adds to our problem. These dug up roads should be brought back to its original size immediately.
2) ‘Even registration numbers’ and ‘odd registration’ numbers system should be introduced in cities where the congestion is beyond control, for example, Margao city. This will discourage using a single vehicle for oneself and people will be forced to go for ‘Car pool’.
3) ‘Hop in and hop off’ can be best for cities like Mapusa on Fridays, the outside vehicles can be parked away in the field. The people can hop in to buy their things and then they can hop off after their purchases are over.
4) Sometimes, it is seen that a two wheeler is parked in the car parking lot, thus blocking the area of a car park. Such things have to be monitored and controlled.
5) It is seen around many police stations and various departments that old vehicles lying there for years together thus occupying the important parking space and thus reducing the road area. Immediate action to be taken as regards to these vehicles.
6) It is common experience that if any accident has taken place and the road is blocked, vehicles are in a single queue waiting for the accident site to get cleared.
7) The best way to reduce the traffic jam / congestion will be constructing flyovers in the cities like Panjim, Mapusa, Margao, etc. even though it is going to incur huge cost, it is now high time that the pollution and bureaucrats should pull up their socks to get the project completed by hook or crook. After all, necessity is the mother of interventions.
