Electronic handling speeds up traffic services

Chief sergeant Saud Zaki Al-Jabri, assistant director of licenses at the Traffic Department, said that his division now provides license plates for vehicles and replaces lost plates, driving licenses, and vehicle licenses via seven offices to ensure a speedy service to the citizens.
Al-Jabri told a local newspaper that the electronic handling of such matters provided drivers with more speed, flexibility and accuracy to benefit from the available traffic services.
Brig. Salah Al-Harbi, director of the Accident Department said, “According to our statistics, there were 4,141 injured persons as a result of 29,374 traffic accidents in 2012.”
Road accidents are either due to the driver, the use of a vehicle that is unfit for driving, or a flaw in the engineering of the road itself.
Al-Harbi added that accident patrols follow up on all accidents. They take a photo of the scene, then make a preliminary sketch of the accident, and write down all other related details.
Unit Supervisor of Traffic Operations, Saad Muala Al-Harbi, said that the unit receives reports of accidents via ten phone lines.
“Qualified and trained personnel obtain the necessary information from the callers,” he said, explaining that digital cameras have been fixed on more than 50 accident-prone sites.
“This insures that we extend all help possible to any person who reports on an accident, or inquires about violations of traffic,” he added, stressing that the operation center at the department communicates with the caller on his mobile, while simultaneously logging on to the department’s computers for further data and information to give information as required.