The police subcommittee on solving traffic problems in Bangkok and its neighbouring provinces convened its latest meeting on Thursday when members recommended sharply increasing the penalty to deter offenders from simply shrugging off tickets.

“The idea emerged at our meeting, and we may implement it in the future,” deputy police spokesman Pol Maj-General Piyapan Pingmuang said yesterday.

At present, just 30 per cent of parking fines get paid on time. “We are studying the feasibility of quadrupling the fines of those who have not come forward to pay,” he added.

According to deputy police spokesman Pol Maj-General Songpol Wattanachai, there had been almost 100,000 traffic law violations in the past month.

“Given that so many motorists have ignored tickets, we have to design harsher punishments or measures. Otherwise, motorists may think they can violate traffic laws and get off scot-free,” he said.

Other possible measures include the seizure of vehicles belonging to drivers who have violated traffic laws and repeatedly failed to pay up.

Meanwhile, Songpol said there had been good results from efforts to ease traffic congestion on Bangkok’s 21 main roads. “Travelling time for those road users has been reduced to an extent,” he said.

He said the National Police Office had also been holding discussions with the State Railway of Thailand on whether it could give more of its space around the Klong Toei intersection for road traffic. “We may downsize safety islands so that we have more traffic lanes on Ram-Indra and Vibhavadi Rangsit roads,” he said.

He added, however, that Lat Phrao Road was one of the major traffic concerns because there were so many residents in the area and travelling time for road users there had increased.