Pedestrian islands on cop agenda for safe crossing of busy roads

KOLKATA: The traffic police have decided to introduce refuge islands to put pedestrians at ease and increase their security. This is another initiative at pedestrian safety after the boom barriers that the Kolkata traffic cops have installed at several places.
A refuge island — also called a pedestrian refuge or apedestrian island — is constructed in the middle of the roads, particularly those that don’t have dividers, to regulate the flow of traffic at a junction. Pedestrians can cross one flank of the road, wait on these islands and cross the second flank when the traffic clears. The islands are designated spots surrounded by asphalt and common road furniture. They are often used when no traffic signal exists and pedestrians need to wait after managing one direction of traffic before taking on the next.


This move will significantly improve pedestrian safety since they will be much more likely to find two small gaps in traffic rather than one situation in which gaps for both directions coincide. Since this will reduce their average waiting time, impatient pedestrians will be less likely to use gaps that turn out to be too short for safe crossing.

DC (traffic) Sumit Kumar said plans were afloat to develop these islands on important and wide roads like Park Circus, Bypass, AJC Bose Road, CR Avenue and Jawaharlal Nehru Road. “This will need permission from KMC and PWD — agencies which maintain these roads. We have written to them this week explaining the concept. Our traffic guards have conducted a detailed survey and their recommendations are awaited,” said Kumar.

Sources said the response from KMC has been positive so far. “We plan to come up with 10 such islands in the first phase and might start with either Ajay Nagar or Girish Park,” said a senior police officer.

In 2016, a Coimbatore-based consultancy firm JP Research carried out a study of fatal accidents and asked Kolkata traffic police to construct refuge islands along with a host of other measures. “We reviewed the present needs on pedestrian movement and decided to go ahead with the plans,” said an officer.