Road safety in Mangalore - An observation

Introduction: Road traffic accidents are one of the leading causes of increased morbidity and mortality in Mangalore City. As per statistics for road traffic accidents collected from Mangalore traffic police for a period of 2 years i.e. 2015 and 2016, there were 327 fatal accidents, 2847 non-fatal accidents, 2653 vehicular accidents, 3245 cases of drunken driving and 3,88,525 cases of traffic rules violations. This alarmingly high incidence of road traffic accidents in a small coastal town motivated us to conduct this study. Methodology: This questionnaire based study was conducted on 400 randomly picked participants including traffic police persons, commuters, and drivers (bus, auto, car, and bike). The questionnaire contained both open ended and closed ended questions. Opinions and suggestions received from the participants for various questions were compiled in MS excel sheet and were analyzed using SPSS version 17.0 programme. Institutional Ethics Committee Clearance was obtained before starting the study. Results & Discussion: The data collected from the participants was listed in form of tables and graphs. The study showed that public is well aware of traffic rules and regulations; and the traffic police is well aware of their responsibilities. In spite of this and the fact that, Mangalore, being a modern and educated city with good infrastructure and well-informed residents, the cases of accidents and traffic violations are quite high. The results of this study list the opinions and suggestions of residents and police regarding increasing accidents and suggestions to control them. The results and suggestions obtained by this study can be used further to spread more awareness among police and public along with familiarizing them with expectations of the other stakeholders. We hope that in long run this exercise can result in increasing awareness, improving the road infrastructure of the city and thus reducing road traffic accidents.