Bus stops

Possibly the most gratifying signals to emerge from this monthly ramble through our strange attempts at joining the rest of Europe when it comes to mechanised vehicles is the fact that within the caverns, offices and possibly board rooms of Transport Malta some small recognition is given to the scribbling surrounding Car Torque. After all, your scribe was in the latter years a full-blown traffic management consultant with the ADT.

One grand area of failure, even for the very powerful Traffic Control Board was the way the Public Transport Authority resolutely ignored all requests to place their confounded bus stops in safe areas.

Last month we harked upon the unfortunate decision to place two bus stops on the deadly roundabout at the bottom of St Pawl Tat-Tarġa hill. I predict that regular users waiting on the surrounding pavement are quite possibly going to be scared out of their minds from time to time.

The arrival of a spanking new bus service, was surely a good time to take serious note of the silliness of the old Public Transport Authority when deciding where to place bus stops.

One of the most hazardous stops figures in this month’s photo of the month. Various people tried to get the stop moved as far back as 1995, without success. It sits in the middle of Mellieħa shopping centre immediately on the approach to a difficult one-way street.

It is difficult because traffic comes down this very steep, slippery, concrete pavement to possibly find a giant bus blocking any chance of seeing if anything is coming.

The bus stop pole is about a metre on the wrong side of the corner. Sadly, drivers who have had their permit to drive issued before 2006 may be unaware of the hazards with such junctions. The bus stop should have been 30 metres further down this confounded junction had been first demanded in 1996.

As the character entrusted with writing the current Highway Code it must be pointed out that a legal notice should be produced forbidding vehicles from overtaking all stationary buses irrespective of whether it entails straddling or crossing continuous lines to complete the manoeuvre.

Otherwise, the continuous centre lines should be broken if the bus stop is on a straight bit of road so that long suffering motorists will not be inconvenienced every time they find a bus either picking up or dropping passengers.

Some years ago the Traffic Control Board attempted to make it legal to cross or straddle a continuous line if a vehicle had stopped or was moving at less than 15km/h.

We failed in this request, but did get enforcement to agree to vehicles being allowed, in the absence of a ‘No Right Turn’ sign to cross-continuous lines to reach premises or turn into a side road.

Surely the time has now come to reappraise the situation and attempt to enforce the unenforceable or ensure, as was approved in 2005 that centre lines would only be continuous when it was importantnot to straddle or cross from the correct lane.

Transport Malta and the police are both fiddling with a balancing act rather like Humpty Dumpy who fell off a wall and couldn’t be put together again.

This month the hot summer sun forced a four-day break in the uplands 30 km from Ragusa in Sicily.

Never, for one moment assume or believe that our neighbours are even on a level with us when it comes to traffic management. They are light years ahead. The country roads are very reasonably surfaced.

The road signs are easy tounderstand and only placed when necessary. 50 km/h signs are placed where there is a real need to reduce speed.

Major roads have centre lines, only continuous when necessary. Give Way signs are used whenthe Stop sign is not requiredbecause there is adequatevisibility and in over 750 km of motoring we saw absolutely noevidence of speed/safety cameras at all.

It is a fact that our roads carry far more traffic, but the farm traffic in rural Sicily is amazing. It would appear that the farming community has purchased giant tractors by courtesy of European Union Funds.

These large and very able vehicles often with a couple of laden trailers set the pace and the traffic management departments have moved with the times. Why can we not be contemporary, if not positively innovative?