Chaos in traffic due to malfunctioning lights in Thiruvananthapuram

Traffic lights in the state capital are broken, making it difficult for cars and pedestrians to navigate city streets. Due to current smart road construction by Smart City Thiruvananthapuram Ltd (SCTL), signals at many key intersections in the district, including Attakulangara, Killipalam, Neeramankara, Over Bridge, and Kowdiar, are unusable.

We now have an enormous difficulty controlling the traffic since some of the lights have failed. The traffic bottlenecks must be manually managed by us. In addition, the absence of traffic lights throughout the summer is taxing our workforce, according to a municipal traffic official.

The SCTL has received a letter from the traffic police requesting that the lights be operable.

Official sources claim that Keltron was responsible for maintaining a few of the dead traffic lights. However, since their yearly maintenance contract ended, the agency has reportedly stopped maintaining these signals.

“Currently, the SCTL is in control of traffic light operations, but they are unable to make necessary adjustments due to the current smart road construction. The traffic officer said, “We have been informed that the lights will be functioning by the end of March.

SCTL has dug up several roadways and severed the traffic light connections in order to install cables. In order to prevent road cutting, we have built cross ducts every 500 meters on city roadways. However, the SCTL needlessly dug up the roadways. According to Anil Kumar Pandala, the former managing director of Trivandrum Road Development Corporation Ltd., “they could have used the cross ducts for laying cables.” The 42-kilometer road network was built by TRDCL as part of the City Road Improvement project.

“The city administration has fallen apart, and they are not acting or stepping in to solve the problems,” he said. Because there are no warning signs or traffic diversion boards along the section of road where smart road construction is underway, drivers are in the dark.

An SCTL representative said that they are working to correct and operationalize the signals. “We will soon fix some of the signals that are not working properly,” the official said.

Are SCTL’s efforts at fault?

Busy intersections including Attakulangara, Killipalam, Neeramankara, Over Bridge, and Kowdiar have dead signals, while other areas of the district have intermittent or non-working signals as a result of ongoing smart road construction by Smart City Thiruvananthapuram Ltd (SCTL).