AMA unveils plan to ensure pedestrian safety

The Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA), in collaboration with the Bloomberg Initiative of Global Road Safety (BIGRS), has launched the “Pedestrian Road Safety Action Plan AMA (2018-2022)” to enhance the safety of pedestrians in the metropolis.

Supported by Amend Road Safety Ghana, the plan will focus on addressing pedestrian safety at authorised crossings and junctions, manage public street spaces, ensure the safety of children who journey to school by foot and engage stakeholders to improve pedestrian safety and awareness.

The five-year plan will also review speed limits, while ensuring a 50 per cent reduction of fatalities on the road by 2020.

The plan is being coordinated by the AMA, together with the Department of Urban Roads (DUR), Ghana Highway Authority (GHA) and the National Road Safety Commission (NRSC).

Action plan

Launching the plan in Accra last Wednesday, the Metropolitan Chief Executive (MCE) of the AMA, Mr Mohammed Adjei Sowah, said the plan would be implemented to reduce the incidence of car accidents recorded over the past five years.

He explained that provisional data from the NRSC indicated that 257 lives were lost through road accidents in 2017, with 951 deaths recorded between 2011 and 2015.

"The action plan is, therefore, to reduce this distressing number of fatalities and road crashes in the city,” he stated.

Healthy city

"The plan is a component of a new initiative - "Partnership for Healthy Cities" - and is part of a global network of more than 50 cities committed to making their citizens safer and healthier,” Mr Sowah stated.

He explained that under the partnership, emphasis would be placed on enhancing intersections of highways in the city.

"An enhancement of the safety features of the Accra-Lapaz intersection at the George Walker Bush Highway, for instance, will be planned to make it safer for all road users who either reside or work in the vicinity, he said.

Mr Sowah added that the action plan had come at a perfect time, as the festive season was fast approaching.

"The AMA-BIGRS team and the Motor Transport and Traffic Directorate (MTTD) have launched an anti-drink driving campaign to prevent drink-driving during the season," he noted.

World report

In a speech read on her behalf, the Executive Director of the NRSC, Mrs May Obiri-Yeboah, commended the AMA for developing the plan to ensure pedestrian safety in the metropolis.

She said the NSRC had over the years embarked on several road safety campaigns to educate pedestrians to adopt the right road regulations while advocating the repairs and repainting of road signs.

She added that statistics from the World Health Organisation (WHO) indicated that more than 270,000 road accidents were recorded each year.

"According to the report, 23 per cent of pedestrian deaths involved children below the age of 16, while 34 per cent constituted inattentiveness on the road," she mentioned.

Mrs Obiri-Yeboah, therefore, called for a collaborative effort to alleviate deaths on roads in the coming years across the country.

For her part, the Deputy Director of Vital Strategies, the initiative's implementing partner for the BIGRS, indicated that the move was in the right direction, as it would promote a safe and healthy city.