Poor condition of city roads that leads to accidents, unregulated autorickshaws that cause congestion on roads, and unauthorised commercial flex banners on roads were the main issues that were dealt with at the road safety meeting held at Collectorate here on Thursday.
Corporation Executive Engineer E. Kamaraj said that works under three schemes were currently being implemented in the city for which 600 km length of road had been dug up.
A total of 350 km length of road had been dug up for laying of underground cables by the electricity board.
The Collector asked the Corporation to immediately re-lay the roads or carry out patch works after the ongoing works were completed, so that the roads were safe for all. Recently, a Class X girl, along with two others on a two-wheeler, was on the way to school, when she fell on the road and lost her leg near Central Prison.
It was pointed out that an open pit on the road was the reason for the accident.
Hence, the Corporation was asked to carry out patch works and re-laying works immediately. Bus operators pointed out that there are 258 autorickshaws plying in the 12.8 km stretch from Salem to Valasaiyur and this is the cause for frequent traffic congestion on the entire stretch.
They said that the unregulated autorickshaws lead to rash driving and frequent clash between private bus and government bus drivers.
Corporation officials said that 119 unauthorised hoardings were removed on roads while 108 such hoardings were removed from highway roads.
The Collector asked officials to make it mandatory that all hoardings should have the permission number and permitted size printed on them. It was revealed that 15 fatal accidents took place on city roads last month. A total of 77 persons had been injured in other accidents.
Also, 55 persons lost their lives on rural roads and 150 had been injured.
Superintendent of Police G. Subbulakshmi said that steps would be taken to reduce road accidents in rural areas.
