Reboundable lane dividers for Hyderabad traffic

The first thing a foreigner in any Indian city notices is the chaos of traffic. The traffic congestion itself is not so much the surprise, as many international cities suffer this clogging because of high traffic volume. But the chaos of non-homogenous traffic that follows neither any lane system or civic traffic laws is the one thing that stands out. This proposal is not to address the problem of clogging at large, but to address the problem of traffic chaos and it's contribution to clogging.

There is also an economic issue and a problem of inconsiderate driving here. Roads are unmanaged commons, and classically follow the tragedy of commons. Particulariy in mixed traffic, lane splitting or driving in between the lanes is more beneficial to two wheelers and detrimental to four wheelers. The oppurtunity cost of the time lost as a whole is of a considerable economic concern, apart from the frequent mental stress. Four wheelers also have high initial costs that are poorly recovered from this unjustified usage of common property.

If lane system is preferred, how to enforce it is the question. In cities where the means of transport are few (only 5 types of transport in US cities, compared to 40 types of transport in Indian cities), this is an automatic behavior where the traffic follows lane system. This is not just because of strict traffic laws.

Strict traffic laws are also not the apt solution as it is expensive both in monetary and human resource terms. Laws to enforce rigid lane system are not just feasible in Indian cities with largely mixed traffic.

The alternate solution that can be explored is the use of lane dividers. Reboundable lane dividers [1][2] could be the right choice, both for concerns of safety, cost and installation ease. The average width for one side of most minor roads is around 30 feet, and this can be comfortably divided into two lanes. The lane dividers can be set up at a distance of 5 feet along the length of the road to prevent lane crossing.

A road will be divided up length wise into beginning, middle and end, as defined by the intersections at either ends. There would only be lane dividers for the starting and ending of a road length. These are at the intersections where lane splitting is a problem. In the middle of the road length wise, for a little distance, there would be no lane dividers to allow for lane changes.

Because of this division, the traffic in the outer lane will be forced to use only that lane. This also solves the encroachment of road space by hawkers, illegal parking, etc., and leads to a more optimum usage of road space.

The usage of reboundable lane dividers is preferable to concrete dividers as this is easier to install and remove; at the same time cheaper and safer to traffic. Also, there is no compulsion on which lanes are to be used by two wheelers and which ones are for four wheelers. This is unnecessary as the real problem is lane splitting, and not two wheelers as such.

There can be a pilot study to improvise or reject this system of enforcement. This solution can be tested on a road like exhibition grounds road. Each side of the road can be further divided into two or more lanes using reboundable lane dividers. The cost of this would only be a handful of thousands. Surely such a cheap experiment can yield beneficial results.

Links
1. http://www.ingalcivil.com.au/ingal_products/product_images/63.jpg
2. http://www.ezydrive.com.au/Portals/2/LaneDiv.jpg
3. http://www.fadaweb.com/urban_transport.htm
4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lane_splitting#cite_note-13
5. http://books.google.com/books?id=ckLcxEb5tM8C&pg=PA273