Bengaluru-Mysuru expressway: 100 fatal accidents since inauguration

There have been 132 fatal accidents on the Bengaluru-Mysuru expressway since January this year, including 100 since March 12, the day it was officially inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The alarming numbers of fatal accidents have pushed the Karnataka police and highway authorities to tighten safety measures and reduce the risk of deaths in what has been considered a “death trap” by road users.

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The Channapatna-Mandya section has been deemed the most dangerous, with 172 accidents and 49 deaths recorded until June 30.

So many deaths on the 10-lane expressway within a short span of time has raised safety concerns.

Acknowledging the unnatural rate of accidents, authorities have explored proposals to reduce accidents and fatalities, including deploying more patrol vehicles, installing violation detection systems, increasing signboards and equipping patrolling officers with speed radar guns and other tools.

Alok Kumar, ADGP, Traffic and Road Safety, Karnataka, acknowledged issues at the expressway that hamper the safety of road users.

“There are some issues here, we cannot say there aren’t any. Signage and boards with instructions are not sufficient and must be displayed continuously on high-speed highways such as this expressway. That has not been done,” he told DH.

The high accident risk is a combination of topographical conditions and human error, he explained, noting that the undulation of the road combined with road users’ negligence could pose a serious safety risk.

Kumar stressed that the Bengaluru-Mysuru expressway wasn’t the only one to report a high number of accidents.

Other expressways, the Mumbai-Pune one in particular, reported a high rate of accidents, “where people were not very careful in the beginning. But things have stabilised over time”.

The state police force has continued to assess the safety measures at other expressways across the country to replicate the best practices on the Bengaluru-Mysuru expressway, he said.

Safety measures

Authorities are exploring deploying sectional speed detection systems on the expressway to automatically capture the speed of vehicles between the two points and flag violations at the nearest toll plaza to enable police to take action against the violators.

“A company is already doing this on two roads in Bengaluru — airport Road and NICE Road — but the facility hasn’t been fully integrated yet,” Kumar said. Police will evaluate the effectiveness of these systems before implementing the same or similar systems on the expressway, he added.

There is also a greater push towards increasing patrolling on the expressway to plug technological limitations that cameras cannot fulfil.

Police will be equipped with handheld radar speed guns that automatically capture speeding violations and issue challans.

On Monday, Ramanagara police began using radar speed guns on the stretch of the expressway that passes through the district.

Kumar also hinted at the possibility of reducing the speed limits for the trucks and heavy goods vehicles to 60-80 km per hour on the expressway.

The NHAI is expected to issue a notification to ban the entry of two-wheelers, three-wheelers and tractors on the expressway soon. NHAI officials have also proposed to build 21 foot overbridges (FOBs) on the expressway.