Causes of Road Accidents and Municipal Responsibility
It is so sad that most traffic and road accidents are caused by bad road and road conditions. This accounts for more than 50% of injuries. Studies in the United States show that, in contrast with once happening as a result of speed and misuse of drugs, the number of injuries caused by bad road conditions is higher. In compliance with the US federal law, cities, towns and towns have adequate and sufficient maintenance to protect secure roads (Coppa, 2010).
Poorly Maintained Signs and Signals
Confusing, missing and damaged signs causes car crash in most of the countries, yet it is the task of the municipalities to correct such road mistakes. Some of the roads also have poorly place signals that do not clearly indicate the right direction. However, some of the accidents that occur at night are as result of poor lighting or even over lighting, which reduces the visibility rate in the roads (Dollery et al. 2015). The government is responsible for any damages, which occur due to unreasonable safety. The municipalities need to discover the dangerous road accidents for them to start the maintaining procedures it might take long. Therefore, there is need to come up with the streamlined approach of holding local municipals accountable for spoiled vehicles caused by neglectful and poor conditions on the roads and highways.
Blocked Sewers and Drainage Systems
The municipals have important duties in adopting a general plan that would help in determining the positions where sewer and sewer systems should be built. The idea of the road and highway design lies on the responsibilities of the municipals to ensure that they are held accountable. Blocked sewers and drainage systems highly lead to the effects of road accidents on the roads, which in most cases end up damaging the vehicles of the road users resulting into damaged vehicles. The municipalities are always held accountable for the vehicle damages caused by negligence in the process of constructing and maintaining it (Lyon and Maxwell, 2009). However, the municipalities are only liable for such vehicle damages only if the municipality is liable for roads and highway construction and maintenance. In so doing, the community and the governments need to come up with streamlined approaches that will ensure that the municipals are accountable for any vehicle damages that may occur on the roads and the highways due to the negligence of maintaining the roads and highways in their localities.
Government Responsibility and Allocation of Funds
However, it is not all the cases that the municipalities are liable for such damages in roads and highways. One of the approaches that can ensure that the municipalities are liable for damages in the highways and systems is to do an investigation whether the local head of the blockage in the sewer systems and failed to take care. They are failing to carry out their duties of protecting their members from intentional road accidents (Moran et al. 2010). Therefore, they are supposed to be liable for the vehicle damages as the citizens have the right of having well-maintained roads and highways since they are the taxpayers. The other is through the central government allocating adequate funds towards proper construction and maintenance of the vehicle. It will be a clear approach of holding them liable for vehicle damages that occur around their region because of poor roads and highways.
Formulating Laws and Devolving Road Activities
Moreover, the government should formulate laws that will guide and illustrate the accusation measure at which such issues will attain the required level of justice. Most of the countries do not have a written document in the form of laws and regulations that can guide the road user on whom to blame in cases of vehicle damages due to poor roads (Dollery et al. 2015). Since most countries allocate such funds in their financial budgets, there is need to have a follow-up measure that will ensure the utilization of the funds and provide the citizens with well-maintained roads and highways. Additionally, the laws may aim at limiting intentional damages of the roads and the highways that cause tremendous damages in the vehicles using the poor roads.
The central government should then devolve most of the road activities to the municipalities. Despite it being an approach of holding the municipals for the damages, it is also an easy way for the governments to ensure that the roads are well maintained, hence raising the durability level. In so doing the municipal will have to conduct road inspections to determine the hazards that may arise from the use of the highways (Lyon and Maxwell, 2009). If an investigation is carried out, resulting in a situation that the municipalities are not taking proper care of the roads, they will surely be liable for any accident on both the roads and highways that lead to damages of the vehicles. Therefore, the municipals need to carry out their activities with due diligence to avoid such case of damages that will channel much of the funds towards repayment rather than developments of the country.
Limitations and Citizen's Rights
Nevertheless, the damages lead to controversial issues if there are some loopholes in the stated approaches. The municipals tend to argue that some causes of poor roads are natural, their effects and damages should not have blamed, and repayment cases on the side of the municipalities. Some causes such as earthquakes and volcanoes have nothing to do with municipal (Coppa, 2010). In such situations, the owners of the vehicles will have to take care of the damages, as the cause is beyond control. Furthermore, the approaches stated above cannot stop the vehicle damages rather it can only mitigate the occurrence and reduce cases of poor roads and highways in most nations. The approaches are significant in maintaining the condition of the roads in a state that is efficient and effective for use to the citizens.
With the approaches, moreover, the citizens will get to understand the right channel and procedures of presenting the claims to the municipal leaders. The public need to have recorded documents that support and illustrates the procedures and processes of following up on the claims (Moran et al. 2010). In so doing the citizens will get to understand the concerned departments in case of such similar issues in the future. Matters of hydrologic connection are, however, the main challenge that faces the court of law of where to state it as a failure on the municipals with the underground seepage increase, raising the water table (Dollery et al. 2015). Therefore, there in need to incorporate several parties in coming up the most preferred elements of holding the municipal liable for the damages that occur as a result of poor conditions of the roads and highways.
References
Coppa, F. J. (2010). County government: A guide to efficient and accountable government. Greenwood Publishing Group.
Dollery, B., Burns, S., & Johnson, A. (2015). Structural Reform in Australian Local Government: The Armidale Dumaresq-Guyra-Uralla-Walcha Strategic Alliance Model. Sustaining Regions, 5(1), 5.
Lyon, T. P., & Maxwell, J. W. (2009). 'Voluntary'Approaches to Environmental Regulation: A Survey.
Moran, M., Baron-Epel, O., & Assi, N. (2010). Causes of road accidents as perceived by Arabs in Israel: A qualitative study. Transportation research part F: Traffic Psychology and behavior, 13(6), 377-387.
