E-Paper
PMC to demolish 100 faulty speed breakers for violation of IRC norms
As per the IRC guidelines, speed breakers must not block the flow of running rainwater. They should have a radius of 17 m, width of 3.7 m, and height of 0.1 m so as to reduce the speed of the vehicle to 25 kmph
Having found at least 100 speed breakers constructed unscientifically and in violation of the Indian Road Congress (IRC) guidelines during an ongoing survey, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) plans to demolish them immediately. The civic body attributes the rising number of accidents and acute traffic congestion on important roads and chowks in the city to these illegal speed breakers. The process of zeroing in on more such faulty and unnecessary speed breakers is still underway according to the PMC.
As per the IRC guidelines, speed breakers must not block the flow of running rainwater. They should have a radius of 17 m, width of 3.7 m, and height of 0.1 m so as to reduce the speed of the vehicle to 25 kmph. Organisations such as the Central Road Research Institute (CRRI) have also come up with a code for speed breakers at various junctions. The PMC too has prepared a separate draft policy for speed breakers according to which, unnecessary footpaths and speed breakers will be removed and new ones will be constructed strictly as per IRS standards.
The city has a network of 1,400 km of roads while the newly merged villages have another 500 to 600 km of roads, taking the aggregate total to roughly 2,000 km. Speed breakers in the city are jointly constructed by the road department, projects’ department and the concerned ward office. The PMC does not have any data on the total number of speed breakers in the city and whether or not they have been constructed as per the IRS standards. According to road department officials, only 10% of the at least 2,600 speed breakers in the city have been built according to IRC guidelines. The road department said that in many cases involving faulty speed breakers, these were found to be constructed in a hurry and were the main reason behind the rise in the number of accidents.
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