The National Highway-66 bypass stretch from Kazhakuttom to Mukkola is increasingly becoming a death trap for road users.
The bypass, which was being widened, has witnessed as many as four persons losing their lives in accidents within nearly a week. The police have also recorded several accidents along the stretch.
The recent spate of mishaps is being attributed to the large number of heavy vehicles that are being plied to transport construction materials to the sites of the widening work as well as others including a shopping mall that is coming up at Akkulam. In addition, the lack of traffic signs has also resulted in many of the accidents, especially during the late hours. In a bid to prevent such instances, the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) has installed caution boards and reflectors, in addition to those that were put in place earlier. With the widening work to continue for at least another year-and-a-half or so, the police will be kept on tenterhooks with measures to prevent further accidents.
There were reports galore on flex boards and advertisement billboards placed on road medians, thus posing danger for motorists in the city. In fact, soon after the media reported on how political parties had thrown all caution into the wind while erecting flex boards welcoming the State-wide yatras of their leaders into the city earlier this month, the City police had requested the parties to remove these on their own.
The danger of such practices, as if sheer coincidence, was made clear with no delay, literally, when a woman on a scooter fell off her vehicle after finding it difficult to avoid one such board that was jutting into the road. However, though most of the ‘yatras’ have come and gone, the flex boards, the billboards and the blinding banners still remain. The Kowdiar-Vellayambalam stretch, and some spots towards the Museum too, bear testimony to this fact.
(Reporting by Sarath Babu George and Dennis Marcus Mathew)
