Rawalpindi: Benazir Bhutto Road becomes centre of problems

[Naveed Yaseen]

Benazir Bhutto Road, the busiest road in Rawalpindi and used by thousands of people daily, now becoming centre of many problems, including daily accidents, traffic mess, lack of parking space for vehicles and growing encroachments.

Like other roads of the city, the flow of traffic on Murree Road has become a nightmare for the commuters as many traffic signals are also out of order or not coordinated to ensure smooth flow of traffic.

From Marir Chowk to Faizabad the road presents a look of car showroom as thousands of vehicles can be seen not running but crawling on the road.

On the other hand when motorists find some space on the road they try to gear-up their vehicles and on many occasions the practice resulted in fatal accidents, as, if, any pedestrian crossing the road suddenly struck the speedy car.

Unmanaged Murree Road claims many lives on monthly basis, due to the negligence of the concerned authorities and drivers, particularly the drivers of the public transport remain in some sort of hurry all the time, and their this practice on a number of times resulted in unwanted accidents.

While Committee Chowk Underpass has been constructed with a hefty amount of Rs 32 million, but at presents the upper part of the road alongwith the underpass is being used as car parking by the shopkeepers and others.

The newly constituted City Traffic Police has tried its best to enforce the motorists to observe strictly the traffic laws, but they turned their ears deaf.

Similarly quarter part of the Murree Road have been occupied by the shopkeepers for different purposes like parking of their cars, displaying of their items and some part of the road is being utilized by the hand-cart pushers.

The flow of traffic at Committee Chowk on Murree road remains jammed for most part of the day, particularly from morning to late evening hours; during these timings it becomes most difficult for pedestrians to cross the road.

Although the Traffic Police have closed many crossing points on the roads in order to maintain smooth flow of the traffic, but it is not working good as the blockades of the crossing points had increased the problems.

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