Dinesh Kamath's news 'Attempts being made to prevent accidents along Sion-Panvel Road' that was published in Newsband

Attempts being made to prevent accidents along Sion-Panvel Road

By Dinesh Kamath

(Above) Picture of Sion-Panvel Road

NAVI MUMBAI: Sion-Panvel highway is become a dangerous road considering the big number of fatal accidents that take place along this road. The vehicle drivers tend to drive at a very high speed on this road resulting in several mishaps. In almost half the accidents that take place here, the pedestrians are found to be victims. Most deaths take place at Kalamboli which is a sensitive region.  

The works of constructing the pedestrian underpasses are in progress, one at Uran Phata and two at LP junction.  Also the work of constructing Turbhe over bridge is going on near Sharayu Motors. The main reason for these accidents taking place is the absence of railings on dividers owing to which many pedestrians tend to take the risk of crossing the road.

Attempts are being made to make the Sion-Panvel Road safe for both vehicles and pedestrians and various suggestions have come from Traffic Policemen. Vashi creek bridge is found to be a sensitive spot and drivers tend to drive their vehicles along this road with full speed and to stop this from happening the traffic police have suggested laying of rumblers on the Vashi creek bridge. Other suggestions include repairing of dividers and streetlights and installing  of terminals at the end of the over bridge at Turbhe-Sanpada where accidents are found to take place at regular intervals.

These accidents keep happening owing to the negligence of both vehicle drivers and pedestrians. It is not that the traffic police department is not making any efforts to prevent these ugly happenings. In fact, traffic policemen tried all sorts of methods like conducting Road Safety Week, counselling both vehicle drivers and members of public, distributing pamphlets and organizing programmes in education institutes particularly to create awareness about the importance of safe driving and the alertness required to be shown while crossing the roads. But in spite of all these efforts made by the traffic police department, some elements display the tendency to violate road safety rules resulting in such accidents.

The representatives of public have suggested posting of traffic policemen at sensitive regions along S-P Road in order to keep a watch and control both the vehicle-drivers as well as the pedestrians. If this is done, according to them, the number of accidents are bound to become less and there will be less damage to lives and properties.