Kshatriya87
Senior Member
- Joined
- Feb 12, 2014
- Messages
- 10,136
- Likes
- 16,039
http://nation.com.pk/lahore/12-Feb-2017/road-safety-issues-in-pakistan
Road crashes are an escalating problem throughout the world, which have vast impacts on societies and economies. The inimitable loss of human life is the horrible outcome of traffic accidents.
World Health Organization estimates that 1.2 million people are killed annually and up to 50 million are injured or disabled on the world’s roads. Various studies on road safety by different organisations reveal that the average annual cost of road crashes is 1% of GDP in developing countries and 2% in developed and highly motorized countries.
The low- and middle-income countries share more than 90% of global road death toll and account only for 54% of world’s total registered vehicles. The global burden of disease is laying dramatically on the developing countries mainly because of their poor road safety policies.
In South Asia, road casualties are found at the greatest percentage when compared with rest of the world.
Pakistan is the world’s sixth most populous country with an estimated population of over 190 million. The fatality rate on the country’s road network remains among the highest in the world at more than 25000 fatalities per year. This is considerably above the countries with the lowest number of fatalities like the UK (3298 fatalities per year) despite the fact that Pakistan is six times less motorised than that of UK.
In Pakistan, the poor are disproportionately affected, with most of the victims being pedestrian, two wheelers and passenger of public transport. The National Injury Survey of Pakistan reveals that the persons aged between 16 and 45 years are major victims of road traffic crashes injuries. Young road users are particularly more vulnerable due to their hasty attitude and poor judgments.
Road traffic accidents are always a human tragedy. But the tragedy is the greatest when children are involved. National road safety secretariat estimates economic cost of road crashes and injuries over 100 billion rupees per annum for Pakistan.
However, the loss is more than just numbers, as road traffic injuries push many families more deeply into poverty by the loss of their breadwinners and impose a tremendous continuous burden on the disabled victims, their families and on health care system.
Fatalistic approach of Pakistani society towards road traffic accidents is one of the big road safety issues. Road accidents are perceived as casual events hence never investigated. A country where people are killed over a dispute of few hundred rupees, road accident casualties are taken as predetermined facts difficult to escape. This ignorance is a big challenge for road safety advocates and should be addressed on emergency basis.
Public and Traffic Police in general are not well aware of advancements in road safety. A few schools have adopted road safety in their curriculum. There is scarcity of road safety awareness and defensive driving training facilities for drivers and other road users as well.
Even though the pedestrians have the right to use most public roads, they are the most vulnerable road users in Pakistan. Road infrastructure does not guarantee pedestrian safety. Pedestrians are not aware to the use of existing road crossing facilities as well. The existing regulations do not encourage enforcement of traffic law against pedestrians for their unsafe practices.
Two wheelers share more than 40% of our bad road happenings. The compliance of safety helmet law for two wheelers is very low. Likewise the design of helmet is not user friendly which discourages its usage while riding. Two wheelers generally and pedestrians particularly behave in a manner that they are not bound to traffic laws.
Motorists do not wear seat belt due to their negligence, carelessness or absence of this safety gadget in most of PSVs and GTVs.
Use of cell phone while driving, walking and even motor-biking is increasing day by day. Giant advertising boards on road sides cause driving distraction. Lack of coordination and collaboration among safety stakeholders is identified as leading road safety issue. Presently there is no formal coordination and data sharing among stakeholders on road safety.
Forty years old buses and goods transport vehicles are plying on our roads. Shortage of public transportation is aggravating the overloading on public vehicles. Public transportation is highly neglected department, lacking organization and monitoring. Resultantly numerous small transportation companies are operating across the country and their regulation seems difficult presently.
Poor road engineering is one of the big issues in Pakistan. Safety design standards are not being followed nor enforced. Road work zones are poorly designed hence they are accidents black spots. The illegal U-Turns made by the businessmen and general public are highly accident prone locations.
Underpasses get chocked during rain making them unusable. Parking spaces are not available in the major cities, leading to traffic jam and road collisions due to illegal parked vehicles. Mixed traffic comprising of two to twenty two wheelers creates mess and road safety of vulnerable road users is compromised.
Overloading of the trucks is continuously imposing damages to roads in addition to early rutting of roads and causing indelible road crashes.
Use of high intensity head-lights have become a fashion, which not only cause glare but also enhance the chances of accident during night.
Fog lights are not installed in most of the vehicles on road. Secondly drivers are not aware of their proper use and accidents which can be avoided, happen.
Vehicle fitness certification required only for public transportation vehicles and is based on visual inspection only.
National Highways Safety Ordinance (NHSO 2000) and Motor vehicle Ordinance (MVO 1965) need be revised and consolidated in one document. NHSO has not yet been adopted by the provincial governments and rules under this ordinance are still not formulated.
Traffic accidents are generally considered as casual events and are treated as secondary offences. Drivers involved in serious road crashes escape criminal and civil penalties mostly. Prevailing traffic violations penalty amount structure is not helpful in changing the driver behaviours because the traffic violation fines are too low. For instance, a fine of Saudi Riyal SR6,000 and 7 penalty points (Rs170,000 approximately) is imposed against violation of traffic signal in Saudi Arabia and penalty for same violation is just Rs200 to 500 in Pakistan.
The enforcement of existing traffic laws in well below the par and is mainly number focused. Driving licensing system is decentralised and compromised. If a person fails to get license in a district or his license is suspended, he can easily obtain from other district or by other means.
The third party vehicle insurance is mostly faked and only covers the passengers inside the vehicle, not even the passengers of other vehicle involved in the accident.
Trauma centers are generally in pathetic conditions in Pakistan with exception to some big hospitals. Punjab Emergency Service (Rescue 1122), and the National Highway and Motorway Police (NH&MP) are the only credible rescue services available to crash victims. Edhi and other similar organisations merely provide transportation services as their ambulances are not well equipped and untrained to provide basic life support.
Road crashes are an escalating problem throughout the world, which have vast impacts on societies and economies. The inimitable loss of human life is the horrible outcome of traffic accidents.
World Health Organization estimates that 1.2 million people are killed annually and up to 50 million are injured or disabled on the world’s roads. Various studies on road safety by different organisations reveal that the average annual cost of road crashes is 1% of GDP in developing countries and 2% in developed and highly motorized countries.
The low- and middle-income countries share more than 90% of global road death toll and account only for 54% of world’s total registered vehicles. The global burden of disease is laying dramatically on the developing countries mainly because of their poor road safety policies.
In South Asia, road casualties are found at the greatest percentage when compared with rest of the world.
Pakistan is the world’s sixth most populous country with an estimated population of over 190 million. The fatality rate on the country’s road network remains among the highest in the world at more than 25000 fatalities per year. This is considerably above the countries with the lowest number of fatalities like the UK (3298 fatalities per year) despite the fact that Pakistan is six times less motorised than that of UK.
In Pakistan, the poor are disproportionately affected, with most of the victims being pedestrian, two wheelers and passenger of public transport. The National Injury Survey of Pakistan reveals that the persons aged between 16 and 45 years are major victims of road traffic crashes injuries. Young road users are particularly more vulnerable due to their hasty attitude and poor judgments.
Road traffic accidents are always a human tragedy. But the tragedy is the greatest when children are involved. National road safety secretariat estimates economic cost of road crashes and injuries over 100 billion rupees per annum for Pakistan.
However, the loss is more than just numbers, as road traffic injuries push many families more deeply into poverty by the loss of their breadwinners and impose a tremendous continuous burden on the disabled victims, their families and on health care system.
Fatalistic approach of Pakistani society towards road traffic accidents is one of the big road safety issues. Road accidents are perceived as casual events hence never investigated. A country where people are killed over a dispute of few hundred rupees, road accident casualties are taken as predetermined facts difficult to escape. This ignorance is a big challenge for road safety advocates and should be addressed on emergency basis.
Public and Traffic Police in general are not well aware of advancements in road safety. A few schools have adopted road safety in their curriculum. There is scarcity of road safety awareness and defensive driving training facilities for drivers and other road users as well.
Even though the pedestrians have the right to use most public roads, they are the most vulnerable road users in Pakistan. Road infrastructure does not guarantee pedestrian safety. Pedestrians are not aware to the use of existing road crossing facilities as well. The existing regulations do not encourage enforcement of traffic law against pedestrians for their unsafe practices.
Two wheelers share more than 40% of our bad road happenings. The compliance of safety helmet law for two wheelers is very low. Likewise the design of helmet is not user friendly which discourages its usage while riding. Two wheelers generally and pedestrians particularly behave in a manner that they are not bound to traffic laws.
Motorists do not wear seat belt due to their negligence, carelessness or absence of this safety gadget in most of PSVs and GTVs.
Use of cell phone while driving, walking and even motor-biking is increasing day by day. Giant advertising boards on road sides cause driving distraction. Lack of coordination and collaboration among safety stakeholders is identified as leading road safety issue. Presently there is no formal coordination and data sharing among stakeholders on road safety.
Forty years old buses and goods transport vehicles are plying on our roads. Shortage of public transportation is aggravating the overloading on public vehicles. Public transportation is highly neglected department, lacking organization and monitoring. Resultantly numerous small transportation companies are operating across the country and their regulation seems difficult presently.
Poor road engineering is one of the big issues in Pakistan. Safety design standards are not being followed nor enforced. Road work zones are poorly designed hence they are accidents black spots. The illegal U-Turns made by the businessmen and general public are highly accident prone locations.
Underpasses get chocked during rain making them unusable. Parking spaces are not available in the major cities, leading to traffic jam and road collisions due to illegal parked vehicles. Mixed traffic comprising of two to twenty two wheelers creates mess and road safety of vulnerable road users is compromised.
Overloading of the trucks is continuously imposing damages to roads in addition to early rutting of roads and causing indelible road crashes.
Use of high intensity head-lights have become a fashion, which not only cause glare but also enhance the chances of accident during night.
Fog lights are not installed in most of the vehicles on road. Secondly drivers are not aware of their proper use and accidents which can be avoided, happen.
Vehicle fitness certification required only for public transportation vehicles and is based on visual inspection only.
National Highways Safety Ordinance (NHSO 2000) and Motor vehicle Ordinance (MVO 1965) need be revised and consolidated in one document. NHSO has not yet been adopted by the provincial governments and rules under this ordinance are still not formulated.
Traffic accidents are generally considered as casual events and are treated as secondary offences. Drivers involved in serious road crashes escape criminal and civil penalties mostly. Prevailing traffic violations penalty amount structure is not helpful in changing the driver behaviours because the traffic violation fines are too low. For instance, a fine of Saudi Riyal SR6,000 and 7 penalty points (Rs170,000 approximately) is imposed against violation of traffic signal in Saudi Arabia and penalty for same violation is just Rs200 to 500 in Pakistan.
The enforcement of existing traffic laws in well below the par and is mainly number focused. Driving licensing system is decentralised and compromised. If a person fails to get license in a district or his license is suspended, he can easily obtain from other district or by other means.
The third party vehicle insurance is mostly faked and only covers the passengers inside the vehicle, not even the passengers of other vehicle involved in the accident.
Trauma centers are generally in pathetic conditions in Pakistan with exception to some big hospitals. Punjab Emergency Service (Rescue 1122), and the National Highway and Motorway Police (NH&MP) are the only credible rescue services available to crash victims. Edhi and other similar organisations merely provide transportation services as their ambulances are not well equipped and untrained to provide basic life support.
Last edited:
