Lucrative Sides To Traffic Jams

hawkers in brisk business

In the natural scheme of things, it is easy to write off some of the little’ miracles’ some road hang-ups affords some of us and connote it with such negativity . How about some of the opportunities it lands on our laps every day without realizing, indulge me for a moment, have you at one point in time wished you were held back a bit in traffic to catch some rest?
 Have you also been so parched that you wished that the traffic wouldn’t move so you can purchase some water or cold drinks perhaps? 
If you can relate to this, then you can identify with this. In the same vein, you can pretty much sit in the comfort of your car and soliloquize without anyone thinking you are crazy, similarly, you can return calls, reply mails and messages [using hands free of course].

Traffic jams serves as a means of relaxation for commuters be it workers, students and suchlike. Particularly students take advantage of this to re jog their memories on lessons learned the day before, or perhaps some quick peek to prepare for an upcoming exam, test, or I.A. [and I have been a proud victim of this, and it helped me out just fine.

 Others who just want to while away the minute resort to browsing or surfing the web, read newspapers to acquaint themselves with what is new, in vogue, and listening to music. Also, drivers who happen to have radios in their vehicles also tune in to an Akan radio station for some comic relief.

 

time to catch up on school work.

There comes the big and obvious one, hawkers are at their money making best when there happens to be a hold up on our roads. They grasp the chance with both hands and cash in other peoples ‘plight’. The screeching of cars to succumb to the desire of traffic is like a ‘second coming’ for them, they briskly run to the windows of vehicles and beseech commuters to purchase their items and this is usually accompanied with their usual chanting of verses, sometimes totally hilarious, all in a bid to urge people to buy. For all intents and purposes, some folks do buy it since they enjoy the jingle they hear or maybe out of sheer necessity. Regardless of their motives, at the end of the day, hawkers gets rid of most of their goods and have enough money to fend for themselves and family for the night and on good days, save the rest for rainy days.

Essentially, traffic situations aren’t all doom and gloom, as individuals we are quick to judge things based on the difficulties and discomforts they offer, this usually clouds our vision in seeing the beauty of it. As individuals, I believe the imperative is to sit back, unwind and enjoy some of the free minutes we have on our hands; think about it, there is not much we can do about it. Would you rather walk? Or perhaps you might want to rain hell and brimstone and darn the consequence. However that isn’t going to make the grass any greener or cause the road to divide and pave way for you. Just relax and take it all in.

                                                            

                                                                  

                                                 

                                                        TRAFFIC IS BEAUTIFUL……

Causes Of Traffic Jam

Have you stopped to think of how and why we encounter traffic congestion everyday on our roads? Well one would like to attribute this to the rapid growing population we face as a country, leading to the increase in the number of trucks, commercial and private vehicles. Moreover, one would not scroll through the streets of Accra without encountering wrong parking, and sometimes slower speeds, which is also another cause of traffic jam.

This has become a monster to commuters since it shows its ugly face in the morning, making people go to work and school late, resulting in low productivity.  During the rush hour, people being in a hurry to go home and relax are are caught up in this stressful and frustrating traffic jam, which may be dangerous to one’s health psychologically, physically and emotionally. Also fumes that comes out from vehicles are very dangerous to one’s health.

In addition to the frustration that comes along with being in traffic is  the higher rate of fuel burns as compared to travel on the open highway.Therefore after spending more on fuel, as well as delay and time waste, you are assured of low input resulting in lesser output.

Traffic jams also bring about road rage, this is as a result of frustrated drivers throwing tantrums. In this situation drivers try to overtake since they think those in front of them are not making any efforts to maneuver their way out of the traffic congestion. Few days ago I witnessed an incidence on the motorway where I saw some drivers out of frustration in traffic jam trying to maneuver their way out of the situation, which resulted in a serious accident causing the deaths of about three people. The bad conditions of our roads also makes it impossible for one to drive at a required speed.

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Emergency vehicles like fire service, police service and ambulance encounter difficulties   getting to the rescue of people resulting in loss of lives.

The enormous cause and effect of traffic jam cannot be over emphasized. There have being suggestions here and there as to how to solve this canker, but inquiring from a primary school pupil, she gave this brilliant idea as to how to go about it, she suggested an overpass at the various intersection and roundabouts to allow vehicles move through various route to prevent  congestion at a particular point.

Some drivers also suggested expansion of some roads. But on the issue of expansion, I see so many buildings at the edge of our road. And if I may ask, did the government think the population will never increase, and never bothered demarcating space for expansion, or citizens just ignored instructions and set up buildings on these demarcated areas. If this is the case, are our policies as a nation being enforced or those policies are just in black and white?.  

The Meaning Of Traffic Lights

“When you see the traffic light, there is something you should know, red means stop, yellow means get ready, green means go, go, go and gooooo”. This is what every child was taught in primary school, as part of educating children on road use.                                                                                                                                                             

Traffic lights are signaling devices positioned at road intersections, pedestrian crossings, and other locations to control competing flows of traffic.                                                                                                                                             As the rhyme rightly implies, green allows traffic to proceed in the direction denoted, the yellow denotes getting ready to stop or move of the intersection, and red prevents any traffic from proceeding, if it’s safe to do so. This shows the power symbolic conventions have to ensure sanctity on our roads.