Jones: New RTA a useful tool, but a lot more work needed
Published:Sunday | February 5, 2023 | 12:37 AMCorey Robinson - Senior Staff Reporter
The Government could have a slew of proposed revisions to the newly implemented Road Traffic Act to consider when stakeholders meet this Thursday.
The Road Traffic Act, which was passed in 2018, took effect last Wednesday after the accompanying regulations were approved by the House of Representatives last year.
“The new Road Traffic Act is a welcomed addition to the tools that we have to promote road safety in the country,” pronounced Dr Lucien Jones, vice-chairman of the National Road Safety Council.
“We have a lot of work to do. We are still keeping our eyes on other areas of road safety. The issue of safer roads is a huge one in terms of road markings and road furniture, potholes ... . Roads such as those on the north coast, which are famously slippery, even when dry, which have accounted for a lot of fatal crashes,” he said, noting that dialogue with the National Works Agency (NWA) to fix certain problematic roadways has been fruitless as the NWA says it cannot afford to.
“We have to also make sure we have safer cars. A number of these cars crumble when they meet in a crash,” Jones said.
Already, a number of the regulations have been causing a stir, with the Government giving a commitment to review a controversial child restraint provision, which triggered the withdrawal of some taxi services across the island and caused some public passenger vehicle operators to refuse to carry children.
Among the other stipulations raising eyebrows is a law against the operating of a motor vehicle where the exhaust or smoke from the engine causes a nuisance or obstruction to the vision of other road users. This carries a $10,000 fine, and was of particular interest to many social media users, who pointed to the state-owned Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC) buses and its notoriously smoky units.
On Friday, however, JUTC managers were restrained in admitting the observation.
“It is not a common practice of the JUTC to dispatch buses that are smoking excessively to the public. However, with an ageing fleet of buses, at times, smoking issues will arise,” the company said in a response to Sunday Gleaner queries.
“If such is encountered during our inspection checks, smoking buses are grounded for further checks in order to address same. Going forward, our expected manpower will increase, as well as our rigid preventative maintenance schedule, which will no doubt improve the reliability of our buses.”
All operational buses, the JUTC said, are serviced at least once per month.
Last week, one civil engineer described the new road traffic laws as knee-jerked, even as he fingered poorly planned roads, an influx of motor vehicles, and an inadequate transportation system among road safety hazards. Even recently rehabilitated thoroughfares such as Constant Spring Road in St Andrew have outgrown their capacity, he argued.
The World Health Organisation and the United Nations Global Decade of Action for Road Safety aims to prevent at least 50 per cent of road traffic deaths and injuries within the next seven years. It also promotes walking, cycling, and using public transport as inherently healthy and environmentally sound modes of transportation. Such options are not facilitated in the design and construction of many of the island’s roadways.
“Nobody wants to take the public transport system and what we have is not adequate. It is not comfortable nor attractive and everybody wants their own cars,” argued the civil engineer, who asked not to be identified.
“We need to start looking at a mass transit system from Papine to Half-Way Tree to Portmore to downtown to Manor Park – something that would move hundreds of thousands of people in the mornings,” he told The Sunday Gleaner.
“As for the traffic laws, I just see a long list of charges and I just hope the Government is not trying to make criminals out of citizens. ... I get the feeling the Government is very proud to be heavy-handed, and whenever I see that, it makes me very nervous,” he said.