Accident prone: Traffic police ease restrictions on movement of heavy traffic

Movement of heavy traffic is only allowed in the city between 11pm to 7am.

KARACHI:

The traffic police have become lenient towards the movement of heavy vehicles in the city on the request of the goods transporters.

You may have observed an increasing number of trucks laden with goods and containers plying the roads throughout the day. This increase is, however, lost on the traffic officials who denied having eased the restrictions.

According to sources in the department, the former Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of Karachi traffic police had allowed the movement of heavy traffic on the roads at all times. Before this, they were allowed to ply on specified roads within the city's precincts between 11pm to 7am.



The restrictions had been imposed during the tenure of the former city government to reduce road accidents and allow for the smooth flow of traffic on the main arteries.

According to data collected by the Road Traffic Inquiry Research and Prevention Centre, 214 people were killed and another 1,640 injured in road accidents involving trucks, trailers and tankers last year.

"For a city with 1.8 million motorcycles, these heavy trucks, dumpers and trailers pose a grave threat," said a traffic police official who has been in the service for the last 20 years.

"The truck drivers can't see the motorcycles moving alongside and end up crushing them when taking a turn." According to the official, truckers can easily move within the city at night when the traffic volume is low and the risk of accidents is largely reduced.

For his part, the acting DIG of Karachi traffic police, Tanvir Alam Odho, said that the movement of heavy vehicles was strictly according to their timings between 11pm and 7am. He added that they were waiting for the posting of the new DIG after which they would increase the checks on heavy traffic travelling via Sunset Boulevard. "We will clamp down on the movement of heavy traffic on roads in the Defence Housing Authority soon," he said.

Truckers' woes

The truckers are, however, are unhappy with the current schedule and demand the city administration to assign a specific route for them from the Karachi Port Trust and Mauripur Truck Stand to Port Qasim via Maripur, Mai Kolachi Road, Sunset Boulevard, Korangi Road, Korangi Industrial Area and National Highway.

The truck owners say this will save precious time and fuel. As of now, they use the Northern Bypass and the Super Highway route in the day time while for Port Qasim, they take the link road at Kathore Bridge. "It will save time and fuel for us as we travel more than 180 kilometres for no reason. The Sea View road is quite empty and we can use that during the day if the police have reservations regarding the Sunset Boulevard route," said Fazal Manan Jadoon, the spokesperson for the United Goods Transporters Alliance.

"We have to stay for an extra day in Karachi because the warehouses are closed at night when we reach and we have to wait for them to open for business the next morning."

Published in The Express Tribune, August 26^th, 2014.