E-Paper
Traffic police hold awareness drives as school buses congest Bengaluru roads
Citizen complaints have been pouring in on Twitter and elsewhere on how large school buses block Bengaluru's roads as they take up significant parking space throughout the day.
Bengaluru traffic police on Wednesday conducted an awareness drive in areas where movement and parking of private school vans and buses leads to congestion. This comes as they introduce new initiatives to reduce traffic woes and chaos in the city and with local body elections looming.
Residents of affected areas frequently flood Twitter complaints of school buses and vans creating bottle-necks or creating unsafe road conditions for children.
School buses are not supposed to be parked outside or around an educational institution's premises except when students are getting on or off them, a top traffic police officer said.
Peenya Traffic Police tweeted a video of a private security guard managing traffic near a school on Hesaraghatta Road. "A small step towards ease of traffic during school hours," the police handle read.
Rajajinagara Traffic Police have taken similar measures; they've trained private school security guards to ensure smooth traffic flow in the area.
"In the interest of the students, our police officers have trained the security guards of the schools in the Thana border to ensure that the students and parents cross the road smoothly during the school opening and closing times."
To this, Kuldeep Kumar R Jain, the deputy commissioner of police (DCP , Traffic, West Division) said, "Excellent. Well done."
"Excellent initiative for managing traffic during school hours. If all the school pitch in to manage traffic arising due to there functioning it will helps citizens immensely. Well done…" he added.
Meanwhile, a school bus in Whitefield continues to operate without a number plate; and has been flagged by citizens, not for the first time.
The same person who flagged the first violation posted a second one this week, saying: "Sorry to be nagging you but the bus continues to come without registration number or school name. I wonder how? I took this pic today."
Whitefield traffic police said school management had been warned.
"The school management has been warned and action taken on the complaint. Awareness and Enforcement will continue. Thank you for bringing this to our notice," they wrote.
Earlier this month, a video shared by a city-based activist on traffic jams caused by alleged encroachment of roads by school buses made rounds, where the road in front of the school is half taken up by a line of school buses and the commuters are jostling with each other, according to the user. There is an unoccupied ground visible in front of the school in the video, however, all school buses were parked in a long row covering a major part of the public road.
Read: Bengaluru school accused of encroaching upon public roads, blamed for jams
