Rapid transit system sought for congested Circular Road

Neeraj Bagga

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, February 16

Traffic mess on the outer Circular Road along the historic wall has prompted residents to demand mass public transport facility on it.

The amply wide about 7.5-km-long road is characterised by 12 historic gates. Traffic bottlenecks due to blatant encroachment by shopkeepers, illegal extension of houses, plying of a large number of slow-moving vehicles like animal-pulled carts and push carts are some of the problems plaguing the stretch.

Sunil Mahajan, a resident of Katra Sher Singh, said high commercial value, along with high footfall, threw a serious challenge to the authorities to put the traffic on the road in order.

For instance, the stretch between Hall Gate and Ram Bagh is so much commercialised that there is no room left even on footpath.

The road being wide, automobile workshops have come up along it. Faulty vehicles are repaired on the road.

Both sides of a stretch between Lohgarh Gate and BK Dutt Gate have been encroached upon by vegetable sellers and shopkeepers.

The stretch from Bhagtanwala Chowk to Shera Wala Gate via Gurdwara Baba Deep Singh Shahid experiences a high flow of traffic. Further, the portion of the road from Sultanwind, Maha Singh and Ram Bagh Gate up to Hall Gate is highly commercial. Rampant encroachments by vegetable vendors, iron-based businesses and others commercial vocations have almost gobbled up the road. A city resident, Kanwaljit Singh, said, there was a high need to run mass transport vehicles on the stretch so as to decongest it.

BRTS incharge Ashwani Narang said the mass transportation service was being run on two roads. “If the authorities ask for extending it, we will propose the name of the Circular Road,” he added.