Agra, Apr 30 (IANS): Built with an aim to shorten the travel time, the 302-km-long Agra-Lucknow Expressway is actually cutting short people's lives. In just 90 days, 36 people of lost their lives, 222 others were injured in over 400 accidents on the Expressway, an RTI query revealed.
Advocated K.C. Jain had filed a Right to Information plea seeking details of accidents on the Agra-Lucknow Expressway.
Talking to IANS, Jain said: "The situation is truly alarming. We have not learnt lessons from the Yamuna Expressway accidents, which is taking a heavy human toll with almost an accident everyday. The Agra-Lucknow Expressway is claiming lives because precautionary measures have not been taken."
According to the data made available by the UP Expressways Industrial Development Authority (UPEIDA), between August 2017 and March 2018 there were 858 accidents causing 100 deaths. Between April 2018 and December 2018, 1,113 accidents claimed 91 lives.
In 20 months, 2,368 accidents claimed 227 lives and maimed many.
Road safety experts are intrigued at lack of interest on the part of authorities to take adequate measures to prevent accidents.
"Initially, this Expressway was not popular. But now the traffic is shifting from the national highway to the Expressway, due to traffic jams and road blocks at dozens of points. People boast having covered the distance in less than three hours," said Jain.
With the rising accidents, ambulance costs and hospitalisation charges incurred by the Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development Authority (YEIDA) continue to soar, he said and added, but they were not doing what they should be as top priority.
In every quarter of the year, some 2.5 lakh vehicles use the Expressway, generating around Rs 18 crore in toll each month, but the YEIDA has not been able to spend money on installing automatic number plate reader cameras and other equipments at every 20 km stretch to monitor speed violations.
The YEIDA has proposed to install such equipment at ten points on the 302-km-long Expressway. The 165-km-long Yamuna Expressway has such monitoring cameras at ten places.