Traffic police and common sense

Oct 17, 2019 Letters

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DEAR EDITOR,

Driving to the Providence Stadium to support the Guyana Amazon Warriors last week took me back a few years to when my teenage daughter was visiting from London and I was driving her to the Trey Songz concert. The traffic was moving at a snail’s pace, compounded by drivers indiscriminately boring on the left and creating a third lane. Anxious to get her to the concert on time, I like other drivers, took evasive action and cut through Eccles and Republic Park.
We made great progress through that residential area, only to be stopped in our tracks by a stern traffic officer when we tried to get back on the Public Road at the Nandy Park Access Road. As we stood motionless in a new traffic jam, I enquired of the officer what was the reason for the hold-up? “Y’all think y’all got sense nuh? Why y’all cut through deh?” I pointed out to him that we were all trying to get to the same place and there was no sign or traffic rank preventing us from using our initiative. Unmoved, the reply came back: “Well yuh got to wait right deh!”
A taxi driver caught up in the mess pleaded that he was not guilty and in fact had a fare that he was taking to the airport to catch a flight. The officer remained unmoved. After a frustrating while, with my daughter beginning to question her father’s love for her, I approached the officer and explained to him that in other countries where I had lived and worked – orderly societies – the logical, courteous thing to do, even without the presence of a traffic rank, was for access to be alternated: one car from the Public Road, one car from Nandy Park, one car from the Public Road, another from Nandy Park. In that way, there would be a steady, orderly and even flow of traffic, nobody would be unfairly delayed, and tempers would cool.
I could see the light bulb going off in the officer’s head – a “brown clothes man, who went to UG”, was how he was described to me by then Commissioner Henry Greene, when I subsequently drew this madness to his attention – but to maintain his pride, he resisted for a few more minutes, then took my stupid advice, and we proceeded on our merry way, my love for my daughter intact.
Fast forward to two Fridays ago, this time, I am on the Public Road and I immediately empathised with the drivers who were again being punished for driving through Republic Park. This time it is a “blue clothes police’’ and my suggestion to him about alternating the traffic fell on deaf ears, and he remained unmoved, as I observed him through my rear view mirror, as I progressed along the Public Road. Clearly, his “brown clothes” superior was of the same short-sighted mindset of his colleague of years gone by, and he was not prepared to contradict orders.
Coming back from the stadium Sunday night, I thought I was doing the bright and right thing by following the more knowledgeable drivers going around the back way by the VVIP entrance past Windsor Estates, to exit by Eccles and, once again, evade the gridlock on the Public Road. But that was not to be. The “borers” created a parallel third lane and gridlock set in when a car got stuck in a bad patch of damaged road. None of the 200 Chinese motor bikes was visible patrolling the route, except one that passed escorting a tinted Prado which, as is now the norm, had a number of cars, including a taxi, trailing behind it with their hazard lights flashing.
A police car arrived, siren blaring and lights flashing. A traffic rank emerged – a “blue clothes man” and gave instructions to lift the car – “bounce it” off the roadway. When I pointed out to the rank that the way how he had stopped on the road was contributing to the traffic jam, and all he had to do was park the patrol car a little more off the road, he waved me on impatiently. He too, remained motionless as I watched him through my rear view mirror.
As I am on the subject of traffic flow, could the Traffic Department explain to drivers heading East on the Embankment Road and who want to turn right into Giftland Mall that there is a solid line painted on the road, which requires them to come to a stop before they turn. On a few occasions, I have been leaving the Mall and stopped at the intersection waiting to turn right onto the Embankment Road, only to encounter drivers who refuse to stop, as if they have the right of way to continue westward, and expect drivers leaving the Mall who have already stopped at the junction, to yield the right of way to them!
The three Cs – care, courtesy and consideration – are sadly lacking among drivers in Guyana. But then again, many of our drivers have never read the Highway Code, or have never attended the lectures for learner-drivers – or both. So when next my daughter is visiting, I might still have to drive her around – she has been a licensed driver in London for years now – for the rules of the road to which she is accustomed, like lane driving, overtaking on the right, yielding the right of way and signaling when turning, are alien to the average driver in this soon to be rich oil economy. Heaven (and the Traffic Chief) help us.

Courteous Road User

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