Dubai: Lack of standard hard shoulders on roads is a cause for concern for motorists in Dubai as it is one of the major causes of traffic jams on highways.
A hard shoulder on a road serves as an additional lane for emergency stops. It also helps emergency vehicles such as ambulances, police cars and civil defence vehicles to move without disturbing traffic.
However, at many locations in Dubai, highways either have too little space on hard shoulders on either side of the road, while at several locations they are non-existent.
Internationally, a standard width of a hard shoulder is around 3.5 metres or as wide as a normal traffic lane.
But that is not the case on most roads in Dubai, and the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) attributes this to lack of available space.
“In some cases and due to the rapid increase in traffic volumes that required increasing the number of lanes on roads, the width of the shoulder was reduced to a minimum or even with none to facilitate additional lanes. However, wherever there is the option of having a hard shoulder, it is built,” said Maitha Bin Udai, CEO of RTA’s Traffic and Roads Agency.
She insisted that RTA follows international standards while building roads, but has to give in to circumstances like the need to widen roads.
“During the design stage, RTA usually looks at the future and the expansion of the emirate of Dubai. Therefore, a wide shoulder is considered during the design stage to be converted into a travel lane if the capacity of the road is increased, while applying that practice will maintain a shoulder width which falls with international road standards,” she said.
However, many motorists fail to buy the argument that hard shoulders have to be sacrificed for road widening.
“What do we do in cases of emergency? Sometimes it is too dangerous to wait on the road when there is no space to tow your vehicles away during a breakdown or accident. I feel safety should be given priority,” said Mohammad Waseem, a long-time motorist in Dubai.
Another motorist, Mariam Yousuf, said sometimes lack of a hard shoulder or a narrow hard shoulder could lead to an accident.
“I have come across situations when people meet with accidents when they pull over on the side of the road for an emergency, but due to the lack of space some portion of the vehicle may protrude out on to the road, leading to accidents,” said Mariam.
Motorists also argue that lack of hard shoulders are a major cause of traffic jams.
“People are forced to stop in the middle of the road when there are minor accidents as on many occasions there are no hard shoulders so you can’t move your car away,” said another motorist on condition of anonymity.
Interestingly, in many cases even if a hard shoulder is available many motorists are confused whether or not to use it.
However, RTA has clarified that hard shoulders must be used wherever available in cases of emergency.
“It is legal to use hard shoulders only in cases of emergency; it should be used as a travel lane to avoid traffic. The hard shoulder should also be used by emergency vehicles and any misuse of it by regular motorists could hamper emergency services,” added Maitha.
She said that the hard shoulder also functions as a buffer zone between the travel lane and pavement for the safety of pedestrians.
RTA has made lessons on usage of hard shoulder a mandatory part of its driver’s training curriculum, while it also creates regular awareness programmes for heavy vehicle drivers on the proper use of hard shoulders.
“For any emergency stops, motorists must drive away from the path of main traffic and display a warning sign 50 metres away from the vehicle in the direction of approaching vehicles,” she said.
