Dubai: The number of pedestrian accidents in areas surrounding labour accommodations and industrial areas is high compared to others, a Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) official revealed ahead of a major pedestrian safety campaign launched on Friday.
RTA, in association with Tristar Transport and Al Marai, is visiting labour accommodations across the city to create greater awareness about pedestrian and cycling safety.
“We have seen that areas like Jebel Ali Industrial area, Al Quoz, Al Muhaisanah and Ruwayya, where there is a high density labour population, have a higher rate of pedestrian accidents. That is why we are reaching out to the labourers by visiting their accommodations and interacting with them to find out the issues as well as making them aware about the safe pedestrian practices,” said Khurshid Khan, a pedestrian safety expert from RTA.
The first leg of the awareness drive was held on Friday at the staff accommodation of Tristar Transport, where workers from six firms living in the vicinity participated.
“We are running this campaign in a staggered manner over several weeks and we are covering different areas every week, so that we can reach out to the maximum number of people,” said Khan.
Moosa Hussain, senior supervisor of the awareness campaign, said that the event aims at highlighting the importance of taking simple steps while on the road or on a pavement.
“We interact with the labourers and entertain them and also they are involved in contests like quizzes and prizes are given away. The points we highlight are crossing streets from designated areas, waiting for pedestrian signals to turn green, making eye contact with motorists while crossing, not jumping over barriers, and using reflective clothing while cycling,” said Hussain.
Over the last decade RTA has taken multiple measures to improve pedestrian bridges, which include building more than 100 pedestrian bridges, which has helped bring down overall pedestrian fatality rate to one per 100,000 people.
This year alone, RTA is expected to complete construction of seven bridges.
Arthur Los Banos, corporate communications manager at Tristar Transport, said they are supporting RTA in its pedestrian safety campaign in labour accommodations because they believe in improving safety on roads for all sectors, including drivers, motorists as well as pedestrians.
The RTA has scheduled similar activities in three other labour accommodations in Al Muhaisanah on March 11, Al Quoz on April 1, and Al Ruwayya on April 22.
