TT (1/many):

The idea is to spark discussion and bring in great ideas and send them to PWD (or something). So feel free to roast this, and my stupidity.

TT- Not thrissurkaran thendi. Thrissur’s traffic. Thrissur has a traffic problem.

Our busy junctions: Toyota to Puzhakkal, Punkunnam, Patturaikkal, Eastfort, MG Road, Shankara Iyer Junction, Post office road, Railway Station Road.

There are many reasons for me to bitch my heart out. Running late, stuck in sweltering heat, in heavy downpours, carrying many heavy bags. And yet I get by no thanks to TT.

Coming from a guy who has been outside the city very infrequently, this might be … very… obviously… biased.

But Thissur’s traffic problem isn’t really a traffic problem. It’s just poor management of traffic, bad roads and bad drivers.

Poor Management of traffic:

·        Puzhakkal: No complaints here. With the NH 66 happening, roads are widening here too. For the first time in the history of Kerala, road construction is happening from one end to the other. So, yeah the traffic block there is forgivable. But has the work stopped?

·        Poonkunnam: Traffic comes from all three ends. From west fort, from Puzhakkal and from Patturaikkal.

The traffic from West fort will have people coming from Ayyanthole, Railway station, MG Road including some parts of the town and maybe some of the people from southern parts of the state. The Patturaikkal traffic will have people mostly from town, east fort, people from Palakkad, and maybe also from the people of South. and the puzhakkal traffic will have all the traffic from the North. And people to and from Guruvayoor.

 The junction is wide, very wide. There shouldn’t be any problem. Right? Right??? NO. There’s traffic. Well, mostly due to the traffic from the north, but that’s not all it. The real problem there is that there is no traffic signal. all chaotic; just like how my pinky acts when I’m trying to play a C minor. I mean the traffic light posts had been installed, and I think they used to have lights there before. But right now, it’s not there. I really wonder why. Sometimes there are policemen controlling it, but when they’re not there, the city buses will wreak havoc. The buses from Puzhakkal road stop right at the junction – right where the road is the narrowest. My research is pending, but I think the traffic will be better if the roundabout is designed better. Something like including a divider for the vehicles going northward from westfort road.

Funny thing is that they've installed signals in the Chakkamukk junction. and it's even worse than the naikkanal signal. Short, doesn't work most of the times, un-coordinated (they have same wait time for all roads, even when there are different amounts of traffic)
 

·        Patturaikkal: Just get rid of that huge-ass inner circle. The roundabout inner circle is a bit too big for comfort taking up precious room for the road. Also, we need small dividers to ensure drivers don’t choose to exercise free will over obeying traffic rules. The traffic in the junction also causes trouble on the bridge. From there it’s a vicious circle. People on the bridge will overtake from all sides and in a few minutes, it’ll look like the infamous Beijing-Tibet Expressway jam in August 2010- atleast that one looked pretty. eh eh.. 

·        And if you’ve come this far, maybe you’d come a bit further. East fort. 

The worst. Literally the worst. It’s a huge, wide junction. But consider the roads leading up there:

·        College road: Incoming traffic includes people exiting the city headed towards south.

·        Bishop House road: Traffic from Punkunnam/Patturaikkal,Viyyoor through townhall – Palace road comes in through the BH road.

·        Palakkad (Main exit) Road: The roads that leads straight to Highway.

·        Jubilee: The road leading to jubilee hospital, also headed to the highway.

 

Save for the jubilee road, all of them are incredibly narrow when leading up to the junction. Particularly horrendous is the college road. The road has two college blocks and multiple branching roads from other colleges and schools! All that and the average width of the road is 5 meters!

 

The east fort junction will almost invariably be busy throughout the day. One solution would be to bring one-ways. Maybe shut down all the traffic towards the Palakkad (main exit) road. Let them use the jubilee road to get to the NH. Let others use other branching roads to get to the road at a few hundred meters away from the junction – where the road is widened and is capable of supporting two lane traffic.

 ...continued