International Journal of All Research Education and Scientific Methods (IJARESM)

ISSN: 2455-6211, Volume 4, Issue 3, March- 2016

Traffic and Road Safety Management in India

Anjali1, Dr. V. K. Ahuja2
1
M.Tech Student, Civil Engineering Department, Baba Mast Nath University, Rohtak, Haryana
2
Head of Department (Civil Engineering), Baba Mast Nath University, Rohtak, Haryana

ABSTRACT

Road safety management is a major concern in India. Now a day‟s roads are the highly hazardous environment in India. Road
safety management reduces the injuries fatalities and major accidents. For every road the accidents are reported and collect the
relevant data about the accidents are reported and review the collected data about the accident should be recorded. Based on the
details and reports the implementation of remedial measures also not possible because of less available data. The analysis are
made depends upon the record to find out the high risk location, vulnerable road users. The reasons for accident is “Unsafe
Conditions or Unsafe Acts” either by the road or by the drivers. This study highlighting the lack of road safety awareness for the
public, drivers and the basic concepts for improving the road safety management in India

Keywords: Traffic, road, management, national highways, signals.

1. INTRODUCTION

Total networks of roads in India are 47lakh KM. The roads are classified under four categories 1) National highways, 2)
state highways;3) PWD roads; 4) Rural and other roads. The distance of national highways is 70934KM, State highways
1,63,896KM, The distance of PWD Roads is 10,05,327KM Rural and other roads are 27,49,805KM. For every 1min 1
major accident occurs, at least 1 accident death for every 1 min. (Road Accidents in India,2010) Ministry of Road Transport
and Highways. The road accidents in India nearly 4 to 5 lakhs the accident rate is gradually increasing every year.

Fig. 1: Registered vehicles 1951 through 2005(Department of Road and Transport)

The vehicles registered in India from 1951 to 2005 was 3,00,000 to 75,00,000. An accident is an incident that happens
unexpectedly and unintentionally. It is occasioned either by human failure or human negligence. Viewed from the above
perspective and also thorough hindsight every road accident is an avoidable happening. The history of human kind has been
one of conquests over the inevitable. It is the process of development and the absence of significant and meaningful results
from the issues. Having considered all the relevant facts and also the suggestions that have come from the different quarters
it appears to us that the four – dimensional approach that had earlier attempted by setting up four different working groups
to go into the four issues of road safety namely, engineering, enforcement, education and emergency care would be the best
manner to approach the issues arising. In the aforesaid publication in which the relevant figures are pegged to the year i.e.
2010 numbered nearly 5, 00,000 resulting in approximately 1, 30,000 deaths and serious injuries including amputation of
limbs to over5,00,000 persons. Road accidents therefore to have potential of being one of the largest challenges to orderly
human existence necessitating immediate and urgent intervention. The feature of vehicles about 10%of all the road

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ISSN: 2455-6211, Volume 4, Issue 3, March- 2016

accidents; 30% of the accidents is related to characteristics of road such as pathway (about 10%), geometry level (10%) and
the other factors (safety barriers, guardrails, signal.)(Variana rosoline et al 2014).The recent development technologies in
mobile communication allows a continual monitoring of drivers behavior by means of acceleration, speed, acceleration rate
of the vehicles and data collection of service record (Astarita et al.,2012)

Road Safety

The approach for road safety management is suggest some measures to reduce the accidents and to be implemented in the
different classification of road networks for minimize the accidents, injuries, fatalities and damage to the properties result of
road accidents table 1. Shows the brief work for good road safety development. The road traffic is also one of the most
important issues in the road safety management. The accident factor in the behavior of human is very high. The basic
concept of safety is the road safety audits, inspections and black spot managements was developed and promoted by
(Perandones and Ramos, 2008). The efforts which are al completely eliminated in the transportation risk and it’s contribute
a reduction of risk and to minimize the crashes level and consequences

Fig. 2: Approach For Road Safety Management

The road network of any city is its lifeline and so monitoring this vital infrastructural resource is important. The problem of
traffic jams and congestion are faced by most major cities of the world. For managing traffic, a city’s administration should
have both real time and historical data about the traffic conditions prevailing on the road network. This information can be
used for quick reaction measures, such as, changing the timings of traffic lights and advising commuters to take alternative
routes through public broadcasts. In the long run, however, this information can be used to plan a better road network by
identifying areas of frequent congestion and building alternative routes. Apart from managing traffic on the roads,
maintaining the road infrastructure in good condition is necessary. Municipalities generally have tight budgets. In
developing countries like India, funds are even scarce. Hence, what the authorities want to know is where, and to what
extent is a road damaged. This would enable them to take preventive measures before further damage occurs or prioritize
repair work based on the severity of damage.

It is worth noting that damaged roads with several potholes also lead to choking of traffic and cause accidents. Hence, in
such a scenario, a system that monitors and reports the condition of roads and estimates traffic on different road segments
would be very useful. Information generated from this system could be integrated with SMS based services that alert users
about congestion, automatic traffic light timers, geographic information systems that suggest less congested paths or roads
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ISSN: 2455-6211, Volume 4, Issue 3, March- 2016

which are less damaged, systems that trigger road maintenance work and analysis tools that help to manage traffic and plan
extensions to the road network. There are several challenges in building such a system. These challenges lie in the areas of
sensing signal processing, communication, protocol design, information storage and retrieval. Traffic on the road or
condition of the road can only be determined through some sensor.

These sensors generate raw values. Appropriate algorithms need to be devised to convert these values into meaningful
events. Traffic scenarios change dynamically and the response to congestion must be swift. Therefore, communication
protocol for such a system must be near real time. On the other hand, the system should be able to estimate if the current
congestion is temporary or persistant to trigger some reaction such as changing duration of traffic lights. Traffic monitoring
systems generate huge amount of data and systems need to process this into useful information, especially those systems
that need historical information to correctly estimate current state of traffic. Road condition and traffic monitoring system
also need to be highly scalable.

India, the second most populous country in the world, and a fast growing economy, is seeing terrible road congestion
problems in its cities. Building infrastructure, levying proper taxes to curb private vehicle growth and improving public
transport facilities are long-term solutions to this problem. These permanent solution approaches need government
intervention. The Government of India has committed Rs. 234,000 crores in the urban infrastructure sector [5]. Bus Rapid
Transit (BRT), metro rails and mono rails are being built in different cities to encourage the use of public transport. But still
there is a steep growth of private vehicles. Some cities like Bengaluru, Pune, Hyderabad and Delhi-NCR, with their sudden
growths in the IT sector, also have a steep growth in population, further increasing transportation needs. Meeting such
growth with infrastructure growth is seemingly infeasible, primarily because of space and cost constraints. Intelligent
management of traffic flows and making commuters more informed about traffic and road status, can reduce the negative
impact of congestion, though cannot solve it altogether.

Problem Statement

The goal is to build a traffic and road safety management system for intelligent route planning, road usage and maintenance
that fulfills the constraints imposed by the Indian scenario. This system should work under varied road conditions, chaotic,
dense and unstructured traffic and a large variety of vehicles. It should be cost effect, easy to deploy (no need to dig or
build overhead structures) and require minimal maintenance. We should avoid the need for specialized equipment. In order
to meet these somewhat conflicting requirements we are willing to be content with system that does an approximate,
aggregate traffic analysis and near real time reporting. We do not want a explicit count or classification of vehicles but
rather some information through which we can deduce the state of traffic on a road segment. Hence, we are willing to trade-
off accuracy of reporting with ease of deployment. We want to build a road monitoring system that is able to better quantify
a road anomaly. Thus, our efforts will be to try find out ways to report severity, intensity or dimensions of a pothole or a
damaged road segment.

Traffic Growth

The uncontrolled and ill planned growth of urban centers has resulted in a number of problems like traffic congestion,
shortages of water and electricity, deteriorating environment and public health. The growing cities have generated the high
levels of demand for travel by motor vehicles in the cities. To match the increasing travel demand commensurate efforts
have not been made to develop the mass transport systems. On the other hand, the Government of India has permitted the
manufacture of automobiles. This has resulted in tremendous increase in the population of automobiles in the cities. The
growth trends (MOST, GOI, 1998) of automobiles at National and City levels are as indicated in Table 1. The automobile
population in India has increased from a mere 0.3 million in 1951 to more than 65 million in 2010. The registered two
wheelers constitute nearly seventy percent of the vehicle population in almost all the cities. Due to higher income levels and
greater needs for mobility in the urban areas, more automobiles are owned and operated in them. More than 90 percent of
the automobiles are located in urban centers.

This trend is observed to be changing in the recent past mainly due to the development of better quality road network
connecting rural areas and richer communities of rural areas going in for the automobiles However, as it can be seen from
the above table, the concentration of automobiles (22 percent) is in eight urban areas. Delhi is having total registered
vehicles of more than 3.5 million (2002) with the predominance of two wheelers and cars, used as private passenger
vehicles. In the other three mega cities i.e. Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai also the two wheelers and cars are predominant.
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However, in the case of Mumbai till 1993 cars were more than two wheelers but the scenario has changed in the last ten
years. The declining growth trend of cars and two wheelers observed in Mumbai is due to updating of registers of the Road
Transport Authorities by discarding the condemned and transferred vehicles. Similar trend in growth of two wheelers is
observed in Kolkata also. While the motor vehicles in metropolitan cities have grown in multi-folds, the road network has
grown at a much slower rate leaving a huge short fall in the capacity required to carry the motor vehicles plying in the
cities.

Table 1. Growth Trend of Motor Vehicles in India and Mega Cities

Year Total Vehicles Registered in Thousands

All India Delhi Mumbai Kolkata Chennai Bangalore Hyderabad Ahmedabad Kanpur Agra

1986 10577 961 480 339 228 307 237 201 94 70

1991 21374 1813 629 475 544 577 443 374 161 135
1996 33783 2630 724 588 812 900 764 572 224 204
1998 40939 3033 860 664 975 1130 887 686 294 260
2008 53121 4357 1020 749 1076 1384 1120 794 428 375
2013 67465 5245 2573 2257 1523 2135 1824 1325 1253 946

TRAFFIC MANAGEMENT

Traffic management is a key branch within logistics. It concerns the planning, control and purchasing of transport services
needed to physically move vehicles (for example aircraft, road vehicles, rolling stock and watercraft) and freight.

Traffic management is implemented by people working with different job titles in different branches:

Within freight and cargo logistics: traffic manager, assessment of hazardous and awkward materials, carrier choice and
fees, demurrage, documentation, expediting, freight consolidation, insurance, reconsignment and tracking
Within air traffic management: air traffic controller
Within rail traffic management: rail traffic controller, train dispatcher or signalman
Within road traffic management: traffic controller

Traffic Load on Road Network

The classified traffic counts conducted at 42 mid block, 10 outer cordon stations and 14 intersections provided extensive
data on traffic flows on the road network of Delhi. Employing this data, the traffic flows have been arrived at on the
adjoining links in the neighborhood of the count points. Thus the traffic flows along with composition have been worked
out for each of the links of the road network identified for the purpose of this study. To validate the of traffic arrived at on
neighboring links sample traffic counts were made to confirm the same. The estimated traffic load along each of the links is
translated into pictorial form using digitized map of Delhi and GIS Software, TRANSCAD it can be seen that the radials
and ring roads carry major portion of traffic movements in Delhi. Using the link traffic loads and composition of traffic by
vehicle type, vehicle - kilometers traveled on each of the links have been estimated and in turn the total vehicle kilometers
traveled by each category of vehicles on the road network of Delhi have been estimated.

Table 4 presents the estimated travel (from roadside counts) made by different vehicles on a normal working day in Delhi
using the primary road network. To validate this data, comparison has been made by estimating the vehicle - kilometers
traveled on the basis of data obtained from the surveys at the fuel stations (CRRI, 2014) and vehicles in use (estimated from
vehicle vintage and registration data). Comparisons are presented in the above table and it can be seen that the estimated
vehicle - kms of travel from road side and the fuel station interviews do not exactly match because most of the external
traffic may not get accounted for at the fuel stations. It can be further inferred that the maximum proportion of travel (80
percent) is made combined by two wheelers and cars. This is followed by three wheelers corresponding about 12 percent of
the total vehicle - kilometers while buses and goods vehicles have almost equal share of 3 percent each. A close observation
of the overall registered vehicles and the estimated in-use vehicles in the above table reveals that only about 55 percent of

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the registered vehicles are in use. This clearly reflects that most of the decade old vehicles have been either phased out or
transferred out of Delhi to other cities (through second-hand sales).

Table 2: Estimated Daily Traffic Load on Delhi Road Network

S. Vehicle Type Vehicle - Kms / day Registered Estimates of

No. (in Millions) Vehicles In-use Vehicles
(„000) („000)
Roadside Fuel
Counts Stations
1 Cars + Taxis 30.689 26.799 Private Cars - 711
(38.7) (34.9) 921
Taxis – 18
2 Two Wheelers 33.823 38.700 2231 1062
(42.7) (50.5)
4 Autos 9.357 5.779 87 87
(11.8) (7.5)
5 Goods 2.514 2.990 158 64
Vehicles (3.2) (3.9)
6 Buses 2.851 2.428 41 NA
(3.6) (3.2)
Total 79.234 76.696 3457 1924
(100.0) (100.0)
Technologies for Monitoring Road Conditions

Popular technologies for road condition monitoring are summarized below. Vision based pothole detection schemes have
still not matured and work only in simplistic scenarios. It will not be easy to make vision based system work with wide
variety of road anomalies and changing visibility conditions. Ground penetrating radar is a non-destructive evaluation
technique for monitoring road conditions. The chief advantage of using ground penetrating radars is that it can detect
internal damage in a road before it appears on the surface.

However, this technique requires specialized vehicles that need to traverse the entire road network. Also, this technique
needs expensive equipment. Most recent work is now focused on using accelerometers for pothole detection. Accelerometer
is a device which is able to detect acceleration forces both static and dynamic. So the vibrations that occur, when a vehicle
encounters a pothole on the road, can be detected by accelerometers mounted on the vehicle. More details in the related
work section. We will also be using accelerometers for
monitoring road conditions.

OTHER TRAFFIC ESTIMATION TECHNIQUES

[YNL07] characterizes unique traffic patterns on road segments. It assumes the presence of a vehicular mobile network or
some form of data communication capability. This capability is combined with GPS to generate location time traces. The
authors then use several vehicular traces on a particular road segment to make spatio-temporal traffic plot which minimizes
the loss of spatial and temporal traffic information. A threshold based quadrant clustering mechanism is used to identify
current traffic condition. The approach of this work is completely different from ours. We do not asume any data
communication capabilities or commuter participation. Also traffic in India is varied comprising not only of cars but also
three wheelers, two wheelers and other types of vehicles. [MPR08] assumes the extensive presence of high end (hence
expensive) mobile phones with sensors to perform rich sensing. The idea is to opportunistically use mobiles present with
commuters as sensors. However, issues like privacy and user participation are still open questions.

Though sensing mechanisms are described, but it is not explained as to how all the sensed data will be processed to give
useful information. The paper also introduces the concept of triggered sensing where a low power consuming sensor can be
used to activate a more power consuming accurate sensor. For example. Traffic estimation is done using cellular
localization to trigger GPS sensing. This concept can be adapted in our system where we can use a single magnetic sensor
to trigger other magnetic sensors when sensor values remain above a certain threshold for a specific amount of time. Or we
can use an acoustic sensor to trigger sensing of AMR magnetic sensors. In this way sensor nodes can conserve energy and

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get active only during possible onset of congestion. This approach again is different from ours. It uses mobile phone as its
base. It has several open issue to address regarding its deploy ability in the context of traffic situation in India.

ROAD TRAFFIC SAFETY

Road traffic safety refers to methods and measures for reducing the risk of a person using the road network being killed or
seriously injured. The users of a road include pedestrians, cyclists, motorists, their passengers, and passengers of on-road
public transport, mainly buses and trams. Best-practice road safety strategies focus upon the prevention of serious injury
and death crashes in spite of human fallibility [1] (which is contrasted with the old road safety paradigm of simply reducing
crashes assuming road user compliance with traffic regulations). Safe road design is now about providing a road
environment which ensures vehicle speeds will be within the human tolerances for serious injury and death wherever
conflict points exist. Furthermore, the highest possible degree of safety shall be ensured when transporting goods by road. It
is of vital importance to monitor and validate the road transportation safety, including comprehensive checks on drivers,
vehicles and safety processes.[2]

The basic strategy of a Safe System approach is to ensure that in the event of a crash, the impact energies remain below the
threshold likely to produce either death or serious injury. This threshold will vary from crash scenario to crash scenario,
depending upon the level of protection offered to the road users involved. For example, the chances of survival for an
unprotected pedestrian hit by a vehicle diminish rapidly at speeds greater than 30 km/h, whereas for a properly restrained
motor vehicle occupant the critical impact speed is 50 km/h (for side impact crashes) and 70 km/h (for head-on crashes).

As sustainable solutions for all classes of road have not been identified, particularly lowly trafficked rural and remote roads,
a hierarchy of control should be applied, similar to best practice Occupational Safety and Health. At the highest level is
sustainable prevention of serious injury and death crashes, with sustainable requiring all key result areas to be considered.
At the second level is real time risk reduction, which involves providing users at severe risk with a specific warning to
enable them to take mitigating action. The third level is about reducing the crash risk which involves applying the road
design standards and guidelines (such as from AASHTO), improving driver behaviour and enforcement.

VEHICLE SAFETY

Safety can be improved in various ways depending on the transport taken.

Buses and coaches

Safety can be improved in various simple ways to reduce the chance of an accident occurring. Avoiding rushing or standing
in unsafe places on the bus or coach and following the rules on the bus or coach itself will greatly increase the safety of a
person travelling by bus or coach. Various safety features can also be implemented into buses and coaches to improve
safety including safety bars for people to hold onto.

The main ways to stay safe when travelling by bus or coach are as follows:

 Leave your location early so that you do not have to run to catch the bus or coach.
 At the bus stop, always follow the queue.
 Do not board or alight at a bus stop other than an official one.
 Never board or alight at a red light crossing or unauthorized bus stop.
 Board the bus only after it has come to a halt without rushing in or pushing others.
 Do not sit, stand or travel on the footboard of the bus.
 Do not put any part of your body outside a moving or a stationary bus.
 While in the bus, refrain from shouting or making noise as it can distract the driver.
 Always hold onto the handrail if standing in a moving bus, especially on sharp turns.
 Always adhere to the bus safety rules.
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Cars

Safety can be improved by reducing the chances of a driver making an error, or by designing vehicles to reduce the severity
of crashes that do occur. Most industrialized countries have comprehensive requirements and specifications for safety-
related vehicle devices, systems, design, and construction. These may include:

Passenger restraints such as seat belts — often in conjunction with laws requiring their use — and airbags
Crash avoidance equipment such as lights and reflectors

Driver assistance systems such as Electronic Stability Control

Crash survivability design including fire-retardant interior materials, standards for fuel system integrity, and the use of
safety glass

Sobriety detectors: These interlocks prevent the ignition key from working if the driver breathes into one and it detects
significant quantities of alcohol. They have been used by some commercial transport companies, or suggested for use with
persistent drunk-driving offenders on a voluntary basis.

Motorbikes

According to statistics, the percentage of intoxicated motorcyclists in fatal crashes is higher than other riders on roads.
Helmets also play a major role in the safety of motorcyclists. In 2008, The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
(NHTSA) estimated the helmets are 37 percent effective in saving lives of motorcyclists involved in crashes.

Trucks

According to the European Commission Transportation Department "it has been estimated that up to 25% of accidents
involving trucks can be attributable to inadequate cargo securing". Improperly secured cargo can cause severe accidents and
lead to loss of cargo, loss of lives, loss of vehicles and can be a hazard for the environment. One way to stabilize, secure
and protect cargo during transportation on the road is by using Dunnage Bags which are placed in the void between the
cargo and are designed to prevent the load from moving during transport.

Regulation of road users

Various types of road user regulations are in force or have been tried in most jurisdictions around the world, some these are
discussed by road user type below.

Motor vehicle users

Dependent on jurisdiction, driver age, road type and vehicle type, motor vehicle drivers may be required to pass a driving
test (public transport and goods vehicle drivers may need additional training and licensing), conform to restrictions on
driving after consuming alcohol or various drugs, comply with restrictions on use of mobile phones, be covered by
compulsory insurance, wear seat belts and comply with certain speed limits. Motorcycle riders may additionally be
compelled to wear a motorcycle helmet. Drivers of certain vehicle types may be subject to maximum driving hour
regulations.

Some jurisdictions such as the US states Virginia and Maryland, have implemented specific regulations such as the
prohibiting mobile phone use by, and limiting the number of passengers accompanying, young and inexperienced drivers. It
has been noticed that more serious collisions occur at night, when the car has multiple occupants, and when seat belt use is
less.

Insurance companies have proposed that the following restrictions should be imposed on new drivers:[citation needed] a
"curfew" imposed on young drivers to prevent them driving at night, an experienced supervisor to chaperone the less
experienced driver, forbidding the carrying of passengers, zero alcohol tolerance, raising the standards required for driving
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instructors and improving the driving test, vehicle restrictions (e.g. restricting access to 'high-performance' vehicles), a sign
placed on the back of the vehicle (an N- or P-Plate) to notify other drivers of a novice driver and encouraging good
behaviour in the post-test period.

Some countries or states have already implemented some of these ideas.[citation needed] Pay-as-you-drive adjusts
insurance costs according to when and where the person drives.

Pedal bicycle users

Dependent on jurisdiction, road type and age, pedal cyclists may be required conform to restrictions on driving after
consuming alcohol or various drugs, comply with restrictions on use of mobile phones, be covered by compulsory
insurance, wear a bicycle helmet and comply with certain speed limits.

Pedestrians

Dependent on jurisdiction, jay walking may be prohibited.

Animals: Collisions with animals are usually fatal to the animals, and occasionally to drivers as well.

CONCLUSIONS

In this paper, the importance of having a traffic and road safety management was accessed and road network improvement
techniques are proposed. The issues related to building a traffic and road condition monitoring system that can be deployed
in Indian conditions have been discussed. A brief survey of current traffic and road condition monitoring technologies was
presented. We noted that traditional traffic monitoring systems are built for developed world. In India where traffic
conditions are varied, lane discipline is not followed and traffic is unstructured these techniques fail to give expected
results. Moreover these systems are expensive to deploy, difficult to install and maintain. Our traffic estimation system tries
to determine traffic density and map itback to congestion levels on a road segment. Some initial experimental results were
presented and architecture of our system stated. For traffic monitoring we intend to use accelerometers because they are
cheap and effective. By using accelerometers we want, not only to detect potholes but also quantify them.

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