Kolkata: School lessons for speeding motorists – Times of India

KOLKATA: Schools may have reopened but motorists driving past schools are yet to come to terms with this. The long pandemic shutdown made many forget that students are back in schools, and they continue speeding up in front of school gates.
Lalbazar has now devised an unique method to generate awareness among such motorists to inculcate the habit of slowing down in front of school gates. The traffic unit has introduced the “student silhouettes campaign” popular across the world but used for the first time in the city. On Wednesday, the East Traffic Guard created multiple “student silhouettes” as a pilot project across La Martiniere School for Girls, asking motorists and bikers to be careful while crossing near the schools and watch out for children crossing the road. All schools in the area will eventually be covered, said cops.
The idea hit the the traffic headquarters after the East Traffic Guard – that handles the maximum school-bound traffic within the city – carried out a week-long survey outside major schools in the past week to find that there has been an almost 25 percent hike in over speeding cases outside school gates as compared to pre-pandemic times. Cops said the violators were ignoring speed limits and posing a danger for school goers in the Ballygunge-Park Street-Minto Park belt during school hours.
“Student Silhouettes is a globally accepted awareness tool and so we thought of replicating it in Kolkata. Our men stood at the school gates and set up life-size replicas of children. Each life-size cutout carried an unique plea on behalf of the students – from asking motorists to be careful as little lives were involved and a fervent plea to slow down whenever required,” said DC (Traffic) Arijit Sinha.