Coimbatore: The accident rate, both fatal and non-fatal, has come down drastically during the last year, said City Police Commissioner P. Sivanandi on Saturday.

On the performance of the city police in 2009, Mr.Sivanandi told reporters that the fatal accident rate had come down from 295 in 2008 to 262 in 2009.

Non-fatal accident rate had come down from 1,082 in 2008 to 836 during 2009.

The average fatal accident rate per month had come down to 17 to 22 from 26 to 30.

Lane discipline had been ensured on Avanashi Road for a smooth and speedy flow of traffic by deploying traffic police personnel and 56 police personnel from Armed Reserve.

As part of the enforcement drive, the number of drunken driving cases had increased from 8,500 in 2008 to 10,500 in 2009. Similarly, the driving licences of 250 persons who were caught for causing fatal accidents and resorting to drunken driving had been cancelled.

Diversion

To ease congestion on Tiruchi Road, which had been taken up for widening into four lane, the authorities had planned to temporarily divert the mofussil buses on Tiruchi Road at Singanallur via Kamarajar Road, Hope College and Avanashi Road for 10 days to help the highways authorities expedite the works.

Sungam Junction round-about would be redesigned to make it motorist-friendly and a traffic police would be posted on Tiruchi Road where a road branches off from Tiruchi Road towards Race Course near the TNSTC depot at Sungam.

A traffic signal would be coming up near the Classic Towers building to regulate the traffic cutting across Tiruchi Road towards Valankulam bypass road and Arts College road.

School zone

The authorities had also planned to review the traffic system near school zones during peak hours and hold discussions with the heads of educational institutions on Monday.

The objective was to ensure that the vehicles were allowed to enter the schools to drop and pick up the children rather than parking them along the school zones.

Parking of vehicles along the schools on arterial roads had become a major cause for traffic snarl.

The Commissioner appealed to the people not to burn waste materials on the Bogi festival day on Wednesday. Mr.Sivanandi said that the city police would co-ordinate with the civic body and identify places including vacant places near police stations, where the wastes such as tyres, rubber and plastics could be dumped.

Mr.Sivanandi also distributed scholarships from the government to a tune of Rs. 5 lakh to the children from police families for pursuing education.

Courtesy - Hindu