Road works: MM Alam Road open for two-way traffic

Conversion of Mini Market roundabout to junction to begin soon.

LAHORE:

MM Alam Road, the city’s premiere destination for eateries, reopened for traffic on both sides on Thursday after some two months of disruptions caused by construction work, though the footpaths and streetlights have still to be finished.

Traffic Engineering and Planning Agency (Tepa) officials said that they had been set a deadline of February 5 to finish the footpaths and install all the streetlights, but the work would likely not be finished till February 15.

Executive Engineer (XEN) Mirza Inamul Haq, a Tepa deputy director involved in the project, said that two openings had been left in the median dividing the road – one at Pizza Hut and the other near KFC – for vehicles wishing to take a u-turn.

He said that a traffic signal would be built at the Pizza Hut intersection, where Ghalib Road meets MM Alam Road, because of the high volume of traffic there. The second turning may later be closed or shifted to another place on the road, depending on requirements, he said. More than 40,000 cars use MM Alam Road every day, he added.

Space has been left on both sides of the 1.48-kilometre MM Alam Road for footpaths eight feet wide, while 50 poles have been erected for LED lights. The lights are still to be installed.

Mian Muhammad Saleem, the president of the MM Alam Road Traders Association, said that the businesses in the area appreciated the repairs done to the previously crumbling road, but objected to the design, specifically the median.

“We were told that the road would be divided by cat’s eyes, not curb stone,” he said. “When we objected to the hard median, we were told that Lesco required it.”

Saleem said he also did not understand why the footpaths needed to be eight feet wide. “They could have just left them four feet wide, leaving space for an additional road lane,” he said.

XEN Haq said that the hard median had been created so cars weren’t switching over to the other side all along the road, which would cause accidents and traffic jams. He said that adding another road lane on either side would have left no room for the footpaths.

He said Tepa would soon begin converting the Mini Market roundabout into a junction with traffic signals. “We are just awaiting clearance from Lesco to begin,” he said.

Once MM Alam Road is finished, work on the 0.6-km road from Mini Market to Main Boulevard will begin. “Work on land acquisition for 30 feet of setback is underway,” he added.

Chief Traffic Officer Captain (r) Sohail Chaudhry said that as far as he was aware, there would be no traffic signal or turning on MM Alam Road. Traffic wishing to turn would have to take it at Mini Market or Hussain Chowk. He said that creating any turning on the road would cause traffic jams.

Tepa and Project Director Israr Saeed said that the total cost of the road construction project was Rs441 million, of which Rs240 million had been spent on MM Alam Road.

He confirmed that a traffic signal would be built at the Pizza Hut intersection.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 1^st, 2013.