Gurgaon’s civic body to rope in pvt firms for better traffic lights

The Municipal Corporation of Gurgaon is all set to invite private companies to bid for offering information technology-related solutions to the civic body for its 450 tubewells and 250 traffic lights across the city.

The Municipal Corporation of Gurgaon (MCG) is all set to invite private companies to bid for offering information technology-related solutions to the civic body for its 450 tubewells and 250 traffic lights across the city.

The system is expected to check jams in the city caused by dysfunctional traffic lights. (Abhinav Saha/HT Photo)

The MCG will float the tenders within 15 days and start the initiative by October, officials of the corporation said. Once the initiative starts, traffic lights in the city will work on latest technologies. As soon as a traffic signal breaks down, an automatic SMS will be sent to the electrical engineer and the joint commissioner. Later, the message will be circulated in a WhatsApp group where MCG officials, traffic police and the contractor can coordinate for the repair and get the signal operation again within three to four hours.

“We are confident that these changes will bring relief to the commuters. We have worked on the budget of the project,” said Rohit Yadav, joint commissioner of the MCG.

“We will hold regular meetings with traffic officials for information on the number of signals that are not functional. We will soon devise a plan in coordination with them so that the traffic issues are solved within a timeframe and the commuters do not have to suffer,” said Yadav.

Yadav said once the project gets underway, some traffic lights will be replaced with automated ones. The civic body has prepared a proposal for spending around `40 lakh on installing automated traffic lights at various spots in the city, including those prone to accidents where many lives have been lost.

The system is expected to check jams that take place in the city due to non-functional traffic lights. The project also aims to boost the water resources of Gurgaon and address the problem of shortage.

The initiative will help officials to keep a watch on the quantity of water supplied, pressure of the flow and quality using latest technologies.

Presently, the work is done manually. Any problem in the supply network is noticed only when there is a disruption in the supply. After the problem is noticed, a complaint is sent to the officials and the executive engineer gets it repaired.

“The system will help us handle the city’s water distribution network better and check leakages and thefts. This will also solve the water shortage problem to some extent,” Yadav said.

The technology will also enable an analysis, wherein both the supplier and the receivers will get a tally of the water sent and received. This end-to-end data will be available on the server of the Municipal Corporation of Gurgaon.