Jaipur: The newly opened U-turn bays on Mahal Road have come under fire from former Jaipur Development Authority (JDA) engineers and road safety experts, who say the pink walls breach Indian Roads Congress (IRC) safety norms and could endanger motorists.Former chief engineer of JDA, Raj Kumar Sharma, said the colour chosen for concrete structures has no sanction under standard road-safety markings. “Indian roads have only yellow-black or white-black stripes to indicate traffic control and obstacles such as concrete crash barriers, median noses or concrete structures inside U-turns. This colour may be disastrous for motorists’ visibility,” said Sharma.JDA officials admitted to the lapse, saying Jaipur Pink was picked during design to reflect heritage value linked to the Walled City. They said rectification would begin soon. “Since it is a violation, we need to change the colour. The best way is to install tiles of recommended colours over the present colour of the walls,” stated a senior engineer.The authority is spending Rs 12 crore on seven U-turn bays between Jagatpura RoB and Dravyavati River culvert on Mahal Road. Four have been completed and opened to traffic from Monday, making four crossings signal-free.Experts, however, questioned the project’s planning beyond colour. They said diversions are advisable only when right-turning vehicles form a small share of total movement.“We have doubts on this project. According to prescribed norms, you can stop right turn at a crossing and allow traffic to take u-turn only if such traffic is less than 20% of the entire traffic volume on the stretch. In this case, more than 40% traffic of the entire volume from Mahal Road takes right turn at a few of these seven crossings,” said a road safety expert.
