Yield way? Bangalore motorists have a field day

A yield junction. Know what it is? It was a well-intended concept of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) and the traffic police and it was implemented in 2009. However, it has backfired and caused more traffic jams, accidents and confusion among Bangalore’s motorists, who are known to be impatient and lacking in driving courtesies.

The result is that instead of reducing traffic congestion, it has only worked to the contrary, endangering the lives of motorists.

Awareness programmes about yield junctions among motorists and citizens was not undertaken before implementing this concept. If you have noticed, there is no Kannada translation of yield junction. It means that a majority of autorickshaw and taxi drivers, who are not well-versed with English, continue to remain in the dark about the concept. And from ignorance, arises trouble.

Till date, some auto drivers assume that it is just a board carrying a word that “could mean a name for something or someone,” as one auto driver put it.

In fact, when you see a “Yield” sign, you must slow down your vehicle, but you do not have to stop completely unless you need to wait for any oncoming traffic to pass.

If you drive by the Windsor Manor yield junction connecting Kumar Krupa Road, or worse, KR Circle next to UVCE College, or High Grounds Junction (the only three yield junctions in the city so far), you will get a taste of what Bangalore motorists make of a yield junction. There is absolute confusion there. And the traffic police know it.

A traffic police official conceded to DNA that the yield junction at KR Circle only contributes to traffic jams because Bangalore motorists lack the driving courtesy of waiting for the traffic on one’s right to pass as required to deserve yield junctions to navigate through.

At KR Circle yield junction, vehicles coming from the City Civil court’s side take U-turn to move towards Vidhana Soudha on Dr BR Ambedkar Veedhi. Those vehicles have to move to the right of the road immediately after taking the U-turn. However, vehicles—including BMTC buses—coming on Sesadri Road from Maharani College side face a problem.

“Accidents occur frequently there, which are not serious in nature, but these cause huge traffic jams—precisely what yield junctions intend to do away with. We have to rush to the spot and clear the vehicles. It (yield junction) is a real headache for us. At least five to six accidents occur here per week,” said a traffic police official.

The problem exists even at Windsor Manor junction and High Grounds Junction, though it is not as bad as at KR Circle Junction.
The result is that while the yield junctions are meant to be negotiated without the presence of traffic police there, utter chaos has now forced the traffic police to post constables to help motorists go through safely without crashing into each other in their hurry to be ahead of the rest.

“The present yield junctions require improvisation. This work will go on simultaneously along with the setting up of new yield junctions planned at Basaveshwara Circle (in front of Chalukya Hotel) and Shivananda Circle (on the far end of Kumara Krupa Road from Windsor Manor Junction),” a BBMP source told DNA.

This is part of BBMP’s plan to implement yield junctions on busy roads that connect the city with Bangalore International Airport (BIA). The work on the projects is slated to start soon.