To tie up with traffic department, railways and cellphone companies to keep citizens informed This monsoon, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation will rope in a brand new slew of initiatives to cause minimum inconvenience to citizens during emergencies or major floods. While civic officials seeking to monitor water-logging will soon approach the Traffic Police to set up a mechanism to obtain video feeds from 64 important traffic junctions that the traffic department's CCTVs monitor for traffic offences, real-time weather updates will also be uploaded on the BMC's all-new portal. The Traffic Department's CCTV project has cameras located at various traffic junctions, each covering an area of 200 metres. The live feed is transmitted to the traffic control room. Additional Municipal Commissioner (Projects) Manu Kumar Srivastava said: "If the feed from traffic department can be made available to the BMC, it will be of great help in deflooding areas. By looking at the videos we will come to know which areas are flooded without actually reaching the spot. We can disperse our machinery accordingly. This will avoid wastage of time,' he said. Speaking at a meeting for monsoon preparedness during which various service providers including mobile phone companies, Srivastava also discussed various other possibilities to ensure smooth communication of information to citizens. "We will also explore the possibility of the display scroll at traffic junctions being used to give updates on rainfall and flooding. This will help commuters to avoid flooded routes,' he said. The BMC will also coordinate with railway authorities to pass on information regarding delayed or disrupted train services through the public announcement system on platforms and inside train compartments. Similarly, citizens may also be able to access information on weather and rainfall on the BMC's portal. "We have 34 weather stations at various locations that give data on rainfall, wind velocity and temperature, every 15 minutes. This data gets digitised and reaches the disaster management control room. We can upload this information on the portal so citizens can get hourly updates,' said Joint Municipal Commissioner (disaster management) S S Shinde. Srivastava said that the BMC will continue to warn citizens in case of flooding or heavy rainfall, to prevent people from venturing into areas where they could get stuck. The FM radio channels, electronic media channels and SMS services from mobile telephone companies will also help in dispersing information.