Deathtraps in Colombo

A few years ago, some of the pavements, in certain parts of the city, of Colombo, were paved attractively with coloured bricks. Then suddenly the Colombo Municipal Council had forgotten about them. Of course, the Mayoress would not be walking on the pavements as she does not have to lay her feet on the dirty ground, with luxury transport provided for her, on the ratepayers account. I wonder whether the Mayoress and the other Councillors know the danger that the pedestrians have to face daily when walking on the pavements.

The once neatly paved areas too have danger spots in that the bricks have either sunk or some of them are jutting out so that any unwary pedestrian, walking along such a pavement, could get tripped and have a fall, which sometimes may be fatal. This would be very dangerous in the case of an elder citizen’s case as if such a person injures his head the repercussions would be very serious.

The example of pavements in a very bad condition is the one on either side of Maya Avenue, from Havelock Town to Kirulapone, where the pavements have not seen any sort of repair for ages. The only good section is the pavement in front of the KFC outlet which they themselves have got done to safeguard their customers who patronise the outlet. The rest of the pavements are in such a bad state of disrepair that people tend to walk on the road which is a little better than the pavement. This they do at the risk of being knocked down by a vehicle driven by a reckless maniac at the wheel, especially in a private bus or for that matter a SLTB bus as many of the SLTB drivers have had their initiation in private buses.

The pavements of all the roads, between and connecting Havelock Road with RA De Mel Mawatha, have to be done to safeguard the pedestrians, especially the elderly and those walking in the night as the roads are not well lit, too. These are a few of the death trap pavements that I am familiar with. I am certain there are a lot more.

In addition to the unevenness of the pavements, there are other hazards, too, that could cause harm to pedestrians. These are the notice boards put up in the middle of pavements to paste notices. Then also the signboards in the middle of pavements which an unwary pedestrian would walk straight into one! These should be shifted to the back of the pavement, so that no pedestrian would get injured by knocking the head as most of them have their mobile phones on to which their whole concentration is diverted, so that they are not aware of the surrounding area when they are walking. An example of this is the pavement on the opposite side of the Thimbirigasyaya bus halt for Pettah bound buses.

In certain areas, the slabs, on the sides of pavements, are broken and if a pedestrian steps on such a slab, he is bound to have a toss and end up with broken ribs or a fracture elsewhere.

Some of the busy roads do not have any pavements at all. A good example of this is Amarasekara Mawatha. The two edges of this road is neither carpeted nor well done for pedestrians to use. It would be good if pavements are done on both sides of this road as vehicle are driven very fast on this road. Pavements are very necessary as most people do not know on which side of the road they should walk as this elementary lesson is not taught in schools or at their homes, unlike in the good old days.

To digress from the state of pavements, I would like to draw the attention of the Mayoress and the Councillor of the respective ward (if they are not in deep slumber) to the pathetic state of an important road in Wellawatte North which is a very busy road during school times and office hours as this road connects Galle Road to Havelock Road. This is the Suvisuddharama Road. Also the connecting road, which is Perakumba Place. The sewerage construction work has been going on for more than four years . All the large pipes that are to be used in other areas are also dumped here and this is a hindrance to vehicular traffic, and of course the residents who are very badly affected by this as in some cases their entrances too are blocked. It would be good if the work on this road too is attended to as early as possible.

HM Nissanka Warakaulle