Deafening Traffic snarl continue to haunt Jammuites

Deafening Traffic snarl continue to haunt Jammuites
Nitesh Sangral
JAMMU, Apr 12: With huge pressure of the vehicles on the roads of Jammu, the measures taken by the administration and traffic police to streamline the system are proving a failure. Just visiting any of the markets like Gandhi nagar, Jewel Chowk, Kachi Chawani, Parade, Canal road and Janipur, one can witness the huge traffic rush with the shifting of Darbar to the winter capital. While at many places traffic police have erected dividers to streamline the movement of traffic, these have become a source of long traffic jams adding to the woes of the public. Adding to this is the wrong parking of the cars and two wheelers on the sides of the road by the people, creating unpleasant situation at times, particularly during the peak hours. “What was need of this divider; it has further narrowed the space for movement of vehicles. There is so much confusion while driving through the stretch. One has to hear just blazing horns while passing through the area”, said Kuldeep Singh, a car owner. Even the shopkeepers are quite amazed by the steps of the traffic police and say that rather than banning the parking; they have added further confusion by erecting dividers. “We had tried to tell officials that putting dividers on middle of narrow road will add further problem, but they did not hear our request. Now see the condition here”, said Gulshan Sharma, a shopkeeper at Canal road. The problem is not only limited to posh locality like Gandhi nagar, but even in Kachi Chawani, Parade and few other roads, permanent dividers have become a problem for the commuters, as they leave very little space to drive during the rush hours. Traffic congestion in city is emerging as the biggest problem as over 50,000 vehicles are being added every year to the already overcrowded roads of the city. The number of vehicles in the city has swelled to 4,54,400 till March this year, excluding the vehicles belonging to the security forces and tourists entering the city. The total road length in the city is 704.22 km, which means that the density of vehicles in Jammu city is 574 vehicles per km, and the situation has been worsening with every passing day with the addition of cars, tractors, motor bikes, trucks, matadors and busses.