Pedestrians urged to use footbridges

The Executive Director of the National Road Safety Commission (NRSC), Mrs May Obiri Yeboah, has cautioned pedestrians to use the footbridges provided across the country to prevent them from being knocked down by vehicles. She said this during an inspection of the Mallam Market, Tetteh Quashie Interchange and Shiashi footbridge projects in Accra.

Mrs Obiri Yeboah spoke to the Daily Graphic and explained that the NRSC and the Department of Urban Roads (DUR) were ready to reduce carnage and injuries on the roads by educating the populace on pedestrian footbridges and ensuring that the law governing their use was enforced in order to arrest the situation.

Educational programmes outlined

She went on to add that "according to statistics, 1490 people have died on our roads between January and November this year and about 40 per cent of them were pedestrians".

The NRSC, the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority (DVLA) and the Ghana Police have outlined programmes which include radio, television and print media broadcasts to educate drivers, passengers and pedestrians about their rights on the roads.

In an interview, the Airport MTTD Commander, DSP Augustine Akrofi, reiterated that offenders of traffic regulations were going to be dealt with as the law stipulated.

According to some pedestrians, the construction of the footbridges was long overdue. They were, however, satisfied that the risk of crossing these roads every day had been reduced.