Publication

Abstract : This study aims to develop a system to prevent accidents occurring due to footboard travelling in buses. Tragedies resulting from footboard travelling in buses are one of the prominent examples of road accidents. A 16 year old student was travelling on the footboard of an over crowded MTC (Metropolitan Transport Corporation) bus at Velachery, Chennai, in September, 2010. The youngster was crushed to death under the wheels of the bus when he slipped and fell down. In another incident, a speeding bus, having passengers hanging on the footboard was hit by a lorry on Rajiv Gandhi Salai, Chennai, in December, 2012. Four students were fatally caught between the bus and the lorry. The basic principle behind the working of the proposed system is to stop the bus from moving when someone stands on the footboard. Even though automatic doors are available, the negligence of the bus drivers to close the door before starting the bus makes the automatic doors moot. But the system ensures that the bus does not move unless the foot board has no passengers and more importantly, only when the doors are closed. In this way, human interference is completely removed there by reducing the number of deaths drastically. © 2013 Asian Network for Scientific Information.