Correspondence from Upper East Region

Traffic lights are intended to control accidents, but there is rather unfortunate incidents of accidents at traffic light intersections in the Upper East Region.

In an exclusive interview with Ghanaweb's Upper East Regional correspondent, Sarah Dubure, the Upper East Regional Head of National Road Safety Commission, Mr. Dennis Yeribu, attributed the cause of the phenomenon to human error, which he categorized into three.

He mentioned the categories as road users who jump traffic lights, those that are inconsiderate of other road users, and those who use the road wrongly.

Mr. Yeribu emphasized that the primary cause of the accidents was the jumping of traffic lights by recalcitrant road users who felt their movement would not be interrupted by those who were in motion because the traffic light had turned green and given them the go-ahead to move.

The Road Safety Officer noted, that over the past few weeks, they recorded cases of recalcitrant road users who jumped red traffic lights and bumped into those who were given the green light to move, resulting in some injuries.

He further noted, that three kinds of collisions occurred at the traffic light intersections.

He explained them as pedestrian hit where motorists collided with pedestrians, vehicle to vehicle collisions, and property damage, where a vehicle ran into a property, a traffic light, or ab infrastructure.

Mr. Yeribu also expressed worry over reckless riding by motorists at the traffic intersections.

"We have the situation where a lot of motorists, once it (traffic light) gets to the green, they want to speed up, so that the number does not get them at the stop side, and we want to admonish the motorists to stop that because it can cause a lot of accidents". He observed.

He cautioned that in other to avoid situations like that, it was very important for drivers and motorists to go below a speed of 30km per hour, at the intersections.

This he noted, would help drivers and motorists to stop on time in the event of looming hazard, as their thinking and stopping distance would be accurate.

Mr. Yeribu also observed that another phenomenon was the knocking down of pedestrians by motorbikes at the intersections.

He noted that in order to ensure the safety of pedestrians, they should use the demarcated section for them, where there are two thin lines ahead of a thicker one.

He advised that anytime the pedestrian traffic light turned green, they should briskly cross the road, while listening and looking; they should look left, right and left again while the 'green man' was still on.

Mr. Yeribu also advised drivers and motorists to be patient and allow pedestrians to cross the road anytime the 'red man' turned red and the pedestrians were yet to finish crossing.

He also admonished pedestrians against the use of mobile phone while crossing the road.

The Road Safety Officer charged pedestrians to avoid wearing dark coloured clothes like, black, red and brown, but rather wear bright coloured clothes like white and yellow at night to make them visible to other road users.

He added that they could alternatively hold flashlights at night, if they did not have brought coloured clothes.

Mr Yeribu also cautioned cyclists against the act of riding their bicycles across the road. He noted that the best way was to dismount the bicycles and push them across the roads.

The Road Safety Officer cautioned children to desist from tying pullovers around their waists whiles riding bicycles, as they could easily get into the bicycle spokes and make them trip over.

He also kicked against the riding of bicycles by children at night.