

COIMBATORE: Giving top priority for pedestrian safety, the city police have planned to install three more pelican crossing signals on Tiruchy Road.
Conventional signals have been replaced with roundabouts and U-turns at many parts of the city. While conventional signals may be useful for vehicular traffic, pedestrians struggle to cross the road. To manage the issue, the Coimbatore city police installed pelican signal at several places mostly on the arterial stretch of Avinashi Road. As many as 13 pelican signals have been installed in the city.
Police now plan to open three more signals on Tiruchy Road, a parallel arterial road of Avinashi Road with a high flow of vehicles. The signals will be installed in front of CMCH, Kallimadai junction and Shanthi Social Service near Singanallur. The requirement of the pelican signal at CMCH junction was a long-standing public demand.
“A pelican signal is a manually operated system with traffic signals for both pedestrians and vehicular traffic. Pedestrians can operate the buttons for the walk signal to cross the road. At these signals, pedestrians can press buttons provided on the side of the roads to operate the red signal for 30 seconds. The green signal will be active after 30 seconds and pedestrians can activate the signal again after a gap of three minutes. The timing may vary to the places depending upon the pedestrian utility,” said a police officer.