The traffic in Peshawar has become impossible. A simple five kilometres drive takes more than an hour. Ever since the maintenance and planning of Peshawar roads was handed over to PDA (Peshawar Development Authority), the traffic and road conditions in Peshawar have been going downhill.
PDA is an overstaffed organisation. It has no specific task and was supposed to be closed until Peshawar road planning and maintenance was handed over to them from Construction and Works department.
In the past few years, neither any new roads were added nor any roads improved, in fact most of the roadways of Peshawar have been closed to provide extra security protection to some areas.
The Ring Road and Central GT Road have deteriorated into dust because of heavy Afghan/NATO transit traffic consisting of 300-400 heavy duty trucks daily.
There has been only negligible maintenance work on roads. Some work on the Karkhano Market Road, linking Peshawar to Afghanistan border, was started some three years ago, but it is still on-going and would probably take another three years to complete.
The current Secretary of C&W Engineer Zahid Arif proposed an elevated Expressway that could be built on the current unused Railway line or even installed on top of the current Peshawar Central Road (GT Road). It will have ramps for getting cars on and off the expressway. There will be no crossing of people or cars or any traffic lights. It would have been a fast-drive road from one corner to the opposite corner of Peshawar.
Unfortunately, this idea was rejected and the PDA are still busy in trading international donors-funded project vehicles to keep their lucrative jobs intact, while the common Peshawaris’ are stuck in traffic or shaken by the potholes in the roads.
SHAHRYAR KHAN BASEER
Peshawar
