KARACHI, Dec 4: At a time when several footpaths and even service roads have already vanished, the trend of using footpaths for commercial activities and converting them into so-called green-belts is flourishing unabated.
Service roads of Sharea Faisal, especially those which fall under the jurisdiction of cantonment boards, have been converted into ‘green-belts’ and boundary walls of some buildings and a few vacant plots, situated between Mehran Hotel and the Saddar police station, have been raised all along Sharea Faisal’s footpath, bringing an end to the concept of service roads which are provided between building alignments and footpaths and serve as alternate routes in case of traffic jams or major accidents.
The citizens feel that soon there would be left no space for the city government for providing an elevated route for going towards and coming from the Airport.
Sharea Faisal’s width has also reduced; a portion of it has shrunk from four tracks to three, compelling motorists to drive cautiously, mingling with the traffic of other tracks.
A portion of the road that links Sharea Faisal with Club Road and Fatima Jinnah Road, situated in front of the former Palace Cinema, is lying abandoned owing to the presence of a traffic police kiosk right in the middle of the road. The vehicular traffic proceeding towards Metropole Hotel from Sharea Faisal for taking the route of Club Road or Sir Abdullah Haroon Road, gets narrowed owing to the limited space available.
Whenever political and religious parties hold their rallies on the busy MA JInnah Road, motorists prefer to take the route of Sharea Faisal via Metropole Hotel, and this leads to heavy traffic jams of long duration all around Metropole Hotel. The citizens think that if the traffic police kiosk is removed and the service road is restored, there will be ample space for traffic proceeding towards Metropole Hotel.
The footpaths of another busy road — Khalid Bin Waleed Road — have vanished as they have been turned into display centres of around 100 car showrooms housed in residential bungalows.
As the owners of the showrooms often park their vehicles on roadsides, drivers of minibuses and coaches halt their vehicles in the middle of the road to pick and drop commuters, and pedestrians have no choice but to risk their lives by walking on the road.
The KBCA had recently dismantled the elevated platforms which the owners of the showrooms and a fast-food restaurant had constructed on the footpaths. But the hue and cry raised by the owners and the subsequent criticism against the KBCA by the city government on the plea that such an action was under the purview of the KBCA, turned the tide in the favour of the owners who have started using the footpaths once again after re-elevating and reconstructing the platforms.
The footpath of Burnes Road (from Fresco Chowk to Jama Cloth Market) disappeared a long time ago when the defunct KMC regularised all the shops constructed illegally on the footpath. Here one can see women and children visiting the nearby Jama Cloth Market walk amidst vehicular traffic, unmindful of the fact that some speeding vehicle approaching them from th0e rear might hit and injure them.
A number of accidents involving pedestrians had already been reported, particularly at the narrow turning of the market, from where a large number of buses, minibuses and coaches take a left turn for approaching Mereweather Tower via M A Jinnah Road.
A number of footpaths situated in the vicinity of Urdu Bazaar and Sobhraj Maternity Home have already disappeared following the establishment of cabins there.
Similarly, there is no provision of footpaths on the busy Shaheed-i-Millat Road as the land earmarked for the purpose of constructing footpaths on the sides of the road has been occupied by nurseries endangering pedestrians who have to walk on the busy road amidst heavy and fast-driven vehicular traffic. A number of people have already fallen victim to rash and negligent driving. The footpaths of National Stadium Road and Sir Shah Suleman Road have also disappeared in the wake of the nurseries there.
The practice of occupying footpaths on the part of fast-food restaurants, barbecue, roadside hotels and vendors, and the presence of a large number of pushcarts on major thoroughfares and at turnings of various busy traffic intersections is causing inconvenience to pedestrians and hindrance in the smooth flow of traffic.
Heavy encroachments can also be seen on footpaths and roads of Sharah-i-Liaquat, Saddar’s Raja Ghazanfar Ali Road, Dawoodpota Road, Mansfield Street, Mir Karam Ali Road, Liaquatabad No 10 traffic intersection, Eidgah, Jamshed Road, Boultan Market, Lea Market, etc. The citizens apprehend that if the trend is not checked a time may come when pedestrians and vehicular traffic will be going together on the roads, indicating a complete chaos.
