‘State has seen dip in number
of road accidents since 2016’
Officials give credit to measures taken to correct black spots
Special Correspondent
CHENNAI
The recent accident involv-
ing a container lorry and the
Kerala State Transport Cor-
poration (KSRTC) bus in Ti-
ruppur has put the spotlight
on the need for rigorous
road safety measures in the
State. The Road Transport
Department’s safety wing,
however, said the total num-
ber of accidents has been
coming down since 2016.
Citing data, a senior offi-
cial of the State Transport
Authority said fatalities have
been coming down. He said
the total number of fatalities
in 2019 was 10,525 against
12,216 in 2018 ( January to
December). In 2017, the total
number of deaths recorded
was 16,157, while in 2016,
which has been kept as the
base year, it was 17,218.
T.S. Jawahar, Transport
Commissioner, acknow-
ledged that one of the main
causes of road accidents was
black spots on highways. He
said as per the Report on
Road Safety, nearly 170 black
spots were identified in
2013-14 all over the network
of highways.
Black spot analysis was
done based on the direction
of the Supreme Court Com-
mittee on Road Safety to
identify accident spots
where 5 or more fatalities
were recorded between
As per a report, nearly 170
black spots were identified
in the network of highways.
2013 and 2015. A total of 85
black spots in 2014-15 and 64
in 2015-16 were identified.
In 2016-17, these spots
were marked in 44 places,
which were recommended
for corrective measures. Mr.
Jawahar said the measures
involved short, mid and
long-term steps comprising
fixing of barricades, speed
breakers, installation of
highmast lights and reflec-
tors and improvement of
intersections.
Monitoring system
Mr. Jawahar added that the
automatic monitoring sys-
tem, for which the State go-
vernment allotted ₹25 crore,
once implemented would
prevent speeding and bring
down accident rates in the
coming years. According to
Highways Department
sources, for the State, which
has a total of 6,634 km of Na-
tional Highways and 11,169
km of State Highways, dur-
ing 2014-15 to 2018-19, a total
amount of ₹1,152.19 crore
was allocated for black spot
correction. This lead to the
decrease in fatalities. The
National Highways Authori-
ty of India too, which identi-
fied 78 black spots last year,
has corrected 17 of them and
work is under way at 43
spots.
The cost in terms of med-
ical expenses, loss of work,
productivity, income and
physiological and psycho-
logical suffering is pegged at
around ₹22,200 crore an-
nually in Tamil Nadu.
A former Highways De-
partment engineer ex-
plained that though high-
ways were designed for high
speed, the police took steps
to curb speeding.
“There are patrol teams
on roads near city limits to
ensure vehicles maintained
speed limits. Several green-
field and even brownfield
projects that are being
planned in the State are ac-
cess-controlled roads where
cross traffic is prevented and
local traffic remains on the
service lanes. The Chennai
Outer Ring Road is an exam-
ple of this,” he added.