Guwahati pedestrians complain as bikers drive through city pavements

GUWAHATI: Footpaths have become out of bounds or risky for the city pedestrians as unruly bikers often have a free run on them. Taking advantage of the traffic police department’s poor monitoring, two-wheeler drivers violate traffic rules and drive along the pavements or park their vehicles on them.
A morning or an evening walk through the pavements has become a nightmare particularly for the elderly people, children and women.
Most of the footpaths in the city are narrow and built above the drains by the public works department. The pavements often get damaged due to the bikers who use the footpaths to skip traffic congestion on the roads.
“My heart skipped a beat when a speeding bike zoomed past me on the footpath at Zoo Road Tiniali on the RG Baruah Road yesterday. I somehow managed to escape and not get injured,” said city resident Rahul Bora.
“The bikers are too impatient to wait for the signal to turn green. They refuse to wait at the signals to get the traffic going. So, they choose the footpaths to move forward, throwing the life of pedestrians at risk,” he added.
He said most of the footpaths do not have the railings which allow the bikers to ride through or park their two wheelers causing great inconvenience to the pedestrians.
A senior Guwahati traffic police officer said police slap a penalty whenever someone is found guilty of riding along the footpaths or parking on the pavements. However, the officer said it is not always possible to keep monitor such bikers across the city, which has a population of around 13 lakh.
The officer, while assuring to make enforcement more strict, urged bikers to cooperate and not ride on the pavements and to make them pedestrian-friendly.
The Bombay High Court, in a recent order while frowning upon the BMC for permitting 11 stalls in front of a hospital at Worli, observed that the purpose of a footpath is to ensure smooth passage of traffic and to make available a safe path for pedestrians to walk.
In Guwahati, the footpaths are often used or occupied by bikers or street vendors.
A few pedestrians, whom TOI talked with over the last couple of days, have urged the state government and authorities concerned to make the footpaths safer for the pedestrians.