Let us combat the traffic of Guwahati, a gateway to North-East India

There are about 3,600 roads in the city, including by-lanes, and more than one lakh vehicles ply on these roads on a daily basis. The city traffic police are left with no other options, but to deal with this enormous traffic with its limited manpower and resources.

Moreover, majority of drivers of city buses, trekkers and trucks are unskilled and they do not know the 'ABC' of traffic signals and other traffic rules and regulations.

The traffic jam problem has become very acute in the city also because of rampant encroachment of footpaths by hawkers, unauthorised parking and reckless driving, especially by the city bus drivers. And all these are happening right under the nose of the authorities concerned. Jumping red lights, overtaking and other forms of violation of traffic rules have become very common in the city. It seems the people of Guwahati have no respect for traffic rules. All these lead to traffic congestion and

Despite being well aware of the problem, the State Government has so far failed to put in place any scientific mechanism to deal with the problem. Some of the facilities available in the city to facilitate smooth movement of traffic are not at all sufficient to handle the situation.

In a fast growing city like Guwahati, which is also the gateway to the North East, the problem of traffic jam has become a serious issue and the situation is going from bad to worse with every passing day.

IN MODERN INDIA, most of the metropolitan cities and the towns face the problem of traffic jam. The problem is aggravating due to rise in number of vehicles throughout the country. Every day, thousands of vehicles are being added to the city streets, which is not only contributing to the traffic jam problem, but also polluting the environment to a great extent.

The residents of Guwahati have been witnessing traffic snarls for more than a week now and the scorching heat is just making it worse to commute during the day.

"We are trying our best to control traffic in the city but we need cooperation from the public to deal with the problem," expressed Prashant Saikia, DCP Traffic.

He further added that if pedestrians become more careful in crossing the road, and vehicles (especially city buses) stop rash driving, these problems will become easier to solve.

In the same vein, another citizen said, "The traffic in GS Road is getting worse by the day. The authority should carry out construction work during night hours instead of harassing the commuters daily."

The slow-moving traffic has been a result of the slow-paced construction work going on in these areas. Further, the newly opened shopping centers and coaching institutes in GS Road are also adding to the problem.

GUWAHATI: With the temperature rising and the on-going city beautification work, commuters in Guwahati are facing a harrowing time stuck in traffic jams, especially in GS Road, Jalukbari and Sarabhati areas of the city.

"It used to take me 15 minutes to travel from my home in Kalapahar to office in Ulubari. But since the last few days, I've been getting stuck in an hour-long traffic jam," expressed Megha Pandey, a citizen of Guwahati.

Guwahati traffic is day by day going detorious. Let's look at some aspects to counter this issue. Here in Guwahati we have seen city buses maximum run by private players. First we should make the city buses compulsory that they shouldn't stop in between middle of the road to get passenger on board. common public should wait at the allocated bus stop only without fail. This kind of mandatory habit we should inculcate within ourselves.lane discipline should be followed and minimum gap.