Traffic signals: Light at the end of tunnel

Friday, Sep 04, 2009

After months of braving chaos at intersections where traffic signals have stopped working an average of 90 across the city there is finally respite. Delhi traffic police has invited a tender for maintenance of signals and blinkers, and this time, the contract includes stringent penalty clauses for non-performance. The contract of the existing companies end in the first week of October.

The tender, published on August 29, is for maintenance of 725 traffic signals and 424 blinkers for the next two years. It will also cover installation of new signals and blinkers. As for the 220 signals which are going to be fitted with intelligent traffic signals (ITS) before the Commonwealth Games, the agreement with the contractors will be amended to include maintenance of them as well.

After the recent downpours, over 130 traffic signals stopped working in the city, leading to complete chaos. The traffic police have now redone the contract clauses to prevent a repeat of the present chaos once the new contracts come into effect. The new agreement sets a time frame for repair of signals all minor fault should be rectified within six hours of receipt of complaints while all major repairs and replacement work will be carried out within two days.

If any traffic signal remains non-functional for over five days, the traffic police will not pay maintenance charge for that signal. Thereafter, a penalty of Rs 500 will be charged. Even after a work contract is awarded, delays will not be tolerated. The contractor will have to finish the assigned work within a stipulated time. Delays will call for a penalty of 10% of total bill for first 7 days and 20% thereafter.

The new contract will have a clause to ensure that contractors are not paid for cable faults and damages to controllers due to short circuits. They will be asked to fit good quality auto cut devices.

The traffic police will regularly review performance of contractors and will terminate contracts and even blacklist companies if performance is not upto the mark. For proper monitoring, the contractor will have to install a computerised fault monitoring system.

Said S N Shrivastava, joint commissioner of police (traffic): "We are trying to improve functioning of traffic signals and ensure proper monitoring. The penalty clauses in the contract have been made stringent.''

Article sourced from timesofindia.indiatimes.com at http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/news/city/delhi/Traffic-signals-Light-at-the-end-of-tunnel/articleshow/4969293.cms