Ban on heavy traffic during peak hours urged

Islamabad: Plying a car on Islamabad Highway from Koral to T-Chowk has become a difficult task as only a skillful driver can accomplish the task.

Don’t get excited after leaving the office for home if you are residing somewhere around the airport or in colonies in Zone 4 and 5, as a complete traffic mess will be waiting for you both at Koral Chowk and some metres ahead of it. Kilometres long queues of vehicles can be seen on this section of the road if one makes a mistake to travel over it particularly during peak hours.

With trucks, buses, coaches and hundreds of private cars it has become a difficult task to travel, but the authorities are least bothered. After construction underway on Koral Interchange and Gulberg Underpass the motorists are in real discomfort and have a number of times appealed to the authorities to ban heavy traffic at least during peak hours.

The motorists can also foresee complete chaos on the road when its widening phase will start soon after the completion of interchanges on each at Koral Chowk, Japan Road and T-Chowk.

Once heavy machinery will arrive at Koral junction flow of traffic will definitely disturb, adding to the woes of motorists, said Mumtaz Alvi, a businessman by profession and living at Judicial Colony. He said long queues of vehicles could already be witnessed at the very point particularly during peak hours and the authorities concerned must foresee the complexity of the situation.

The 12.5 kilometre portion of the Expressway from Koral Chowk to GT Road is perhaps the busiest part as far as movement of vehicles both light and heavy is concerned. But the wear and tear of the road speaks volumes about the negligence on the part of authorities concerned for so long before the incumbent government decided to rehabilitate it on modern grounds.

SSP Traffic Malik Matloob said two inspectors for Lohi Bher and Sihala had already been designated to regulate traffic in the section. When the road was last reconstructed and changed into a concrete pathway back in 2007 there used to be severe traffic mess as it usually took almost an hour to reach Koral Chowk from PWD Housing Society, said Zahoor Ahmed a resident of Media Town.

The situation would get worst this time around as during past eight years the population had increased considerably in the private housing societies, he said adding every second day a truck breaks down in the middle of the road and causes traffic jam.

Being built with a cost of Rs21.814 billion the Islamabad Signal free Corridor would benefit hundreds of thousands of motorists by reducing the travel time over the 25km road by at least 20 minutes besides giving a comfortable journey to them.

The SSP traffic admitted the fact that technical faults develop in most of the loaded trucks due to poor condition of the road and it takes seven to eight hours to remove the faulty vehicles.  Zulfiqar Shah, a bank officer and a resident of Soan Gardens, suggested that the entry of heavy traffic on Islamabad Highway from GT Road should be banned at least during peak hours in order to avoid traffic mess.