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BTRAC's No-parking signs vs painted road kerbs
Written By silkboard - 18 July, 2009
Traffic Bangalore parking BTRAC suggestion Enforcement Transportation Enforcement kerbstone
For all the good work that traffic police is driving in the city via BTRAC, I do think that the "no parking" boards (few thousands of them that have come up) are not the best use of money. Here are my issues with them:
- The signs don't convey their "range". May be that the RTO manual has it written loud and clear that each sign covers 100 meters (I don't know the range myself), but the fact is most of us don't know. So, its common place to see vehicles parked everywhwre except right under the no-parking boards
- There is a cost to maintenance. Street furniture with metal that could be uprooted and sold as scrap is potentially risky business.
- Its expensive from coverage point of view (message conveyed per feet length of road). Cost is a relative thing, right? So hear out the alternative I mention below
A better alternative would be to go for painted road side kerbs (or curbs). The edge of the pavements today, in most places are painted. I am guessing that BBMP paints the pavements, BTRAC may be painting only the hard medians (the concrete dividers). The black/yellow stripes that they paint don't convey anything - a potential waste of usable "signage space".
Imagine this
- Red paint on kerb - can't park
- Yellow paint - can stop for load/unload, but not park
- Green - can park
- No paint at all - can park if there is no no-parking board in sight.
Painting on concrete would be a lot cheaper than standing sign boards every 50 meters. Painted kerbs look nicer as well.
And, a bonus - as part of the road kerb painting exercise, pavements would get some much needed attention.
[Will try upload some pictures to make the point more clear]
COMMENTS
Practical suggestion... I agree
sanjayv - 20 July, 2009 - 07:37
I agree with SB's suggestion. Painting the kerb/sidewalk/footpath is one standard way to indicate no parking or restricted parking zones internationally. The quality of the footpath as well as paint will be important in order for the sign to be long lasting.
This way, drivers have an idea of the exact no parking zone, which takes one variable away. Enforcement, behavioral change and driver education are other pirces of the puzzle that will eventually help the trafic overall. Thre is no magic bullet to solve our problems.
velaboy - 18 July, 2009 - 14:10
There will be lots of people happy to join the PIL. File a PIL.
rs - 18 July, 2009 - 15:02
Frankly it does not matter whether they paint the kerb or put signs unless they enforce them. They have put up No Parking signs all over the place but nobody seems to care - people blatently park right in front of the signs. So all of this is useless if they expect it to work by appealing to the better sense of our fellow citizens - as no such thing exists.
In fact, in some cases - the road on which I live on, for example - these signs have resulted in people doing other illegal things - like parking in front of gates or on the footpaths or putting stones to reserve their spots etc.
Ramesh
What is being discussed here as I understand is about Sine-ages and sustainable Traffic. This coincides with one of the CiSTUP mandates. In yesterdays meeting with CiSTUP this point was brought up by Prof TG Seetaram. He is looking for proven experts on sine-age technology. It would be better if interested PRAJA members contact TGS directly IMHO.
srkulhalli - 19 July, 2009 - 13:10
SB, You are right to the extent that painted Kerbs would be a better way to indicate parking than sign boards. In addition to the advantages you have listed, another important one is to reduce signage clutter. The lesser the signs one sees while driving, the better is the impact of each sign. Signages should thus be used judiciously and the non-important ones should be put into the background, like the no parking. The negative I see is it needs better maintaineance, should ensure it is painted regularly, else over time it will be a guessing game
However, as Ramesh right points out, it hardly matters because a lot of people do not obey. However, it is not a question of enforcement only. The parking slots have to be there in the first place, neatly put, should not obstruct pedestrians and vehicles alike. This requires good design of the road to start with, enforcement is a layer on top of that. Which is where you should take the trouble to read this document, specially there is a section on footpath-complete(pg 10) and another on signages(pg 27) (still in the works) - which would is a good place to give your suggestions.
http://www.filesanywhere.com/fs/v.aspx?v=896d6b8f5f617376ae6d
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