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NEW DELHI: If you have ever tried to walk down from Kalkaji to the Nehru Place flyover through the K-Block roundabout or locate a friend's house in South Extension, your chances of reaching your destination easily are remote. If the traffic on the main road has not deterred you, the chaos inside certainly will. Unregulated traffic and speeding vehicles make negotiating the streets of Delhi's colonies an uphill task. Delhi Urban Art Commission member and Kalkaji resident H K Yadav said: "Kalkaji is in this mess partly due to faulty town planning. But residents' are more guilty as they are fast turning the residential blocks into commercial areas." "Kalkaji does not have demarcated entry and exit points. There are only approach roads from the Outer Ring Road and Deshbandu Marg, half of which are commercialised inviting more traffic in the area," Yadav said. The situation is the same in several such "black spots."Residents of the Pandara Road flats often find themselves in heated exchanges with unauthorised car parkers in Pandara Market. "We cannot go for walks at night and there is a perennial nuisance due to horns blaring. And some residents found their car accessories stolen," said Nalin Chauhan, a resident. Who is responsible: As part of the Bhagidari scheme, the Delhi police has been entrusted with managing colony traffic. But they have their own problems, including staff-crunch. Police commissioner R S Gupta says, "Beside the local police and traffic personnel, the responsibility also lies with city planners, civic agencies and residents, who can interact regularly with the police to help ensure smooth traffic regulation, in the true essence of Bhagidari," Gupta said. He also attributed the problem to lack of garage space, encroached residential blocks and shops within the colonies. Joint commissioner (traffic), Maxwell Pereira, said: "There is no traffic police deployment in the colonies, but whenever there are specific complaints from residents, it is the area traffic officer's responsibility to resolve it." There are other reasons too. In west district, big residential colonies like Janak Puri have a problem with many inlets and outlets within the area. "Every resident wants to have a cut on the road in front of his house. The same is true of Patel Nagar and Hari Nagar," said DCP (west), Dependra Pathak. But residents look for police presence to regulate traffic in an area like Maharani Bagh, where the traffic is flowing through the colony following the closure of Ring Road crossing due to the Noida Toll Road. DCP (New Delhi), Manoj Lall, said: "Residents in Pandara Road and Tilak Marg face traffic chaos due to lack of parking space ." Police officers say that RWAs can play a pro-active role in managing local traffic.
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