I read with interest and with disappointment the article ‘Street decorations nuisance’ (July 21).

It is stated that the National Commission for Persons with Disability “spent the past year on a ‘wild goose chase’ in a bid to stop street decorations from obstructing wheelchair users”. Apart from wheelchair users, I wish to add those pushing pushchairs and/or prams.

My disappointment arises from the fact that, according to the report, the commission has been writing to the local councils concerned and has only lately been advised by one of the Councils to refer the matter to the police. Furthermore, the commission chairman is reported to have quite rightly pointed out that “the national transport committee should also look into the matter”.

I really cannot see how the national transport committee can instruct the removal of the decorations in question when it is Transport Malta itself that is causing obstacles for wheelchair/pushchair/pram users on pavements.

I am referring in particular to Triq R. Caruana Dingli, in San Ġwann. Transport Malta has ‘planted’ a bus stop and a big sign regarding the Kappara project in the middle of the pavement. How can the transport watchdog order the removal of nuisances caused by others when it is the same regulator that is creating nuisances?

The case of Triq R. Caruana Dingli is not an isolated one. Going around Malta and Gozo one sees a lot of such obstructions, created by the so-called transport watchdog. In this case (as in other similar nuisances created by the transport watchdog) I quote and slightly rephrase the commission’s chairman’s words: mobility should not stop and start at the whim of the transport watchdog.

I understand there is a Traffic Management and Road Safety Directorate at Transport Malta which, I feel, should also look into this kind of road safety. Or is this just a perception on my part?