‘Safe School’ project resumes in Delhi after hiatus

PWD is designing a safe zone outside a Najafgarh school, aiming to enhance pedestrian safety with redesigned roads and crossings, set for completion in a year.

New Delhi

The pilot project at DAV School in south Delhi. (HT Archive)

The Public Works Department (PWD) is in the process of designing a dedicated safe zone outside the Government Boys Senior Secondary School No 2 in Najafgarh, and has called for interested parties to prepare formal sketches to implement the street redesign under the “Safe School Project”, officials said.

To be sure, the safe zone redesign was conceptualised three years ago and students had come up with designs over two years ago, but it remained on paper.

Officials said that the work covers a 1.23-kilometre stretch—the road from the T-point of Shivaji Marg on Najafgarh Road to Jyoti Memorial Hospital on both sides, the section from RHTC Hospital to the government veterinary hospital, and the internal road leading to the school gate.

“The agency will prepare detailed layout plans, general alignment drawings, tender drawings and working drawings for street redesign in accordance with Indian Road Congress guidelines and national urban street design standards. We already have the designs and the suggestions from the children on how the area has to be made safer and more pedestrian-friendly,” a PWD official said.

The initiative is led by the Delhi government’s transport department, in collaboration with the directorate of education and the district road safety council. The school was chosen as it is part of a dense education cluster, with around 16,000 students from 12 schools using the street network near the Najafgarh Stadium.

The road has a right-of-way of approximately 34 metres, and the length of the street intervention is planned at about 240 metres, extending to roughly 463 metres when all connecting arms are included.

“The area has heavy pedestrian movement, students spilling onto carriageways and congestion caused by buses, cars, two-wheelers and informal parking during school hours. The proposed plan outlines a redesigned intersection with safe pedestrian crossings, accessible footpaths, traffic calming elements, shared non-motorised vehicle lanes and designated multi-utility zones and parking bays. Signage, markings, street furniture, lighting and landscaped waiting areas are also part of the planned safety components,” the official said.

Officials said the project follows a pilot undertaken near DAV School in Vasant Kunj, where the street outside the school was redesigned by students. While the project originally aimed to scale such redesigns to at least one school in each district, only the pilot has been executed, with the Najafgarh project marking the second across Delhi.

Under the broader safe school programme that is supported by HumanQind, a social design organisation that partners with IIT-Delhi, interventions typically include reduced vehicle speeds near schools, marked pedestrian crossings, redesigned junction geometry, improved footpaths for barrier-free access, designated pick-up and drop-off zones, signage and road markings and better street lighting.

The objective is to create safer walking environments for students, parents and teachers, particularly in areas with dense school clusters and high traffic volumes, with most of the inputs coming from the experiences of the students. PWD officials said that once the tendering process is completed, the project will be executed in about a year.