HCM City transport authorities are set to begin a three-month-long inspection of passenger buses and taxis to ensure traffic safety during the holiday season that will last until Tet in mid-February.

Deputy Minister of Transport Le Manh Hung said the need to monitor the operations of inter-provincial vehicles has become imperative after several horrific accidents on national highways involving them.

He said ensuring traffic safety during the Christmas, New Year and Lunar New Year period is also important because a large number of vehicles and travellers will be on the streets then.

He said most accidents in the last few months have involved inter-provincial vans and buses. They have killed or injured dozens of people on highways after colliding with other vehicles including motorbikes, trucks, and trains.

Since late October, the city Department of Transport has urged transport companies to review their activities this year and rectify shortcomings.

It has also called on city bus stations to join with transport operators to carefully inspect vehicles to ensure safety.

The stations must be scrupulous in ensuring that unsafe vehicles do not get out on to the streets, and drunk and inexperienced drivers do not get behind the wheels of buses, it said.

Deputy chief of the city Transport Inspection Agency, Le Hong Viet, said during the Christmas and New Year period, inspectors would focus on vehicles travelling to popular entertainment and amusement destinations.

During Lunar New Year, they would turn their attention to bus stations and stops at export processing zones, industrial parks, universities and colleges, large factories and venues where the Spring Flower Festival and other festivals are held, he said.

During all their checks, they would pay special attention to compliance with traffic rules by inter-provincial buses and crack down on illegal parking, careless and drunk driving, and speeding.

The city transport authorities have also urged major bus stations to sign contracts with companies and factories with large numbers of workers to pick them up at their workplaces to avoid overloading bus stations.

Almost all migrant workers at city-based EPZs and IPs usually return home to celebrate Lunar New Year, the year’s biggest festival.

VNN/VNS