The National Highways Authority of India took a significant step in terms of road safety and highway patrolling with the introduction of Route Patrolling Vehicles called the Rajmarg Saathi to improve incident management services across national highways. With advanced technology and improved functionality, the ‘Rajmarg Saathi’ RPVs are set to play a vital role in maintaining road safety, monitoring traffic, and responding to emergencies in real-time.
Key Features of ‘Rajmarg Saathi’ RPVs
The newly introduced ‘Rajmarg Saathi’ RPVs are designed to conduct thorough inspections of National Highway stretches. These vehicles will actively monitor traffic, detect hazards, and respond to emergencies, ensuring a smoother flow of traffic while prioritizing the safety of road users.
The RPVs come equipped with several advanced features that make them an invaluable asset for highway patrolling:
- High Communication Devices: RPVs come with high-class communication equipment to fast-coordinate traffic control units and the emergency responding teams.
- Safety gear: the vehicle has installed the safety appliances required in effectively dealing with accidents as well as the other calamities to be brought out to the highways.
- This made RPVs noticeable: NHAI focused on increasing the externality and brandings of high-way patrol vehicles to boost their visibility; this provides easy identification that enables making alerts to citizens, thus enabling high awareness related to safety measures among road users.
Additional Functionality for Response to Incidents
One of the main objectives behind the introduction of ‘Rajmarg Saathi’ RPVs is to improve incident management on national highways. These vehicles are specifically designed to identify and address emergencies swiftly, minimizing traffic disruptions and enhancing road safety.
Each RPV is equipped with:
AI-Powered Dash Cameras: Such cameras feature advanced AI video analytics which can identify issues in road infrastructure such as cracks and potholes among others to detect damages to the structure. It identifies moving cars, people walking along, and signages of roads; it also allows an on-scene live feed view of all road features.
Emergency Equipment Storage Room: The cars are pre-fitted with closed cabinets that have space for many emergency tools. This aspect makes it easy for teams patrolling to access most of the equipment needed to handle an emergency.
These advanced technologies, besides facilitating instant identification of problems, also help NHAI take proactive measures on road maintenance. The data captured by these cameras, in the form of footages of road damage and other issues, is collected at regular intervals and then fed into NHAI’s maintenance systems to initiate action on priority.
Specifications and Service Life of RPVs
To ensure the reliability of these vehicles in the long term, the NHAI has laid out specific guidelines regarding the service life of the ‘Rajmarg Saathi’ RPVs.
According to NHAI:
The RPVs will be replaced once they exceed 300,000 km or after three years of operation. This policy ensures that the vehicles remain in optimal condition and are capable of providing efficient patrolling and incident management services.
This proactive approach ensures the RPVs remain functional, and by doing so, ensures they continue to be ready in the future to handle national highway patrolling demands for a greater safety and reliability of road networks.
Role of RPVs in Road Safety and Traffic Management
Route patrolling operations are a critical element in maintaining safety on national highways. By ensuring timely response to incidents, these operations help minimize disruptions and prevent accidents. With the new ‘Rajmarg Saathi’ RPVs, NHAI aims to enhance the effectiveness of these operations.
The RPVs will monitor emergencies and then respond to them as well but will also generate very useful information concerning the road conditions. This information shall be instrumental in road maintenance and repairs efforts, allowing NHAI to rank areas that should be put under attention and thereby diminish road hazards with time for better driving.
Conclusion
One of the significant contributions of National Highways Authority of India in the context of safety and management of highways has been this one. This advanced vehicle will ensure that managing incidents, road monitoring, and road user safety are effectively supported. NHAI has started working on new standards of highway patrolling in India through work on visibility, safety, and proactive maintenance on roads.
It can be aptly said that in the future, such initiatives will play an important role in the overall plan of road infrastructure in India. These would contribute towards a better and safer network of national highways.
Refer :
PIB, Link to article
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