No Traffic Lights: Kota Becomes India’s First City to Completely Scrap Signal Systems. (Image Source: File)
Kota, a city in Rajasthan, was long hailed as the "Coaching Capital of India," but it has earned a new, equally impressive title: the first city in India to function entirely without traffic lights. This pioneering feat in urban planning has been making daily commutes seamless for the residents and the huge population of students.
With an estimated city population of 1.4 to 1.5 million in 2025 as against 1,001,694 in the 2011 Census, traffic management is a gigantic task.
The UIT Kota took up the challenge of remaking the entire road network rather than continuing with the conventional traffic signals.
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The system is based on intelligent engineering and uninterrupted flow:
Ring Roads: A network of interlinked ring roads enables vehicles to avoid inner-city congestion and traditionally busy junctions.
Flyovers and Underpasses: Several major junctions have been upgraded with flyovers and underpasses, which separate the traffic vertically. In other words, traffic flowing in various directions does not intersect, and hence, there is no need to stop.
Clear Design: The intelligent road geometry, clear signage, and lane markings guide traffic flow with minimal confusion, relying a great deal less on signals.
The traffic police and volunteers help maintain the flow during peak hours and assist pedestrians in crossing.
In this design-based solution, traffic continues to move with a steady and predictable pace, reducing time, fuel wastage by idling, and stress drivers face. Kota's success thus becomes a revolutionary blueprint for sustainable urban mobility across India.
Primarily, Kota's claim to fame is its coaching institutes. Hundreds of thousands of students throng the city every year from all over the country for coaching in highly competitive entrance exams for engineering and medical courses.
This huge inflow of young, mobile population brings about considerable changes in Kota's economy and social fabric, hence giving it the nickname "Coaching Capital."
Beyond education, Kota has an industrial base manufacturing various items such as chemicals and engineering equipment and the peculiar local stone known as Kota Stone.
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