February 20, 2007	Tuesday	Safar 2, 1428

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MUZAFFARGARH, Feb 19: The city is faced with a confluence of traffic problems, paralysing parts of the city for hours and further aggravating motorists already plagued with a rash of problems, Dawn has learnt.

As there is no bypass to facilitate the traffic from and to Multan, Dera Ghazi Khan and Jhang, motorists have to travel extra 13 kilometres to pass through the city.

The absence of a bypass on Multan-Muzaffargarh, Multan-Dera Ghazi Khan and Muzaffargarh-Jhang roads has made travelling a nightmare.

The district administration has closed the main city entrance and placed barriers there to stop all vehicles, apart from private cars and jeeps, from driving through. This has increased the travelling time for commuters from Muzaffargarh to Multan from 40 to 70 minutes.

Vehicles from DG Khan, Layyah and Jhang are diverted to Alipur Road and from there again to Tulheeri Road to reach Multan Road.

Moreover, Alipur and Tulheeri roads are not fit for a heavy flow of traffic as DHQ Hospital, Government Girls’ College, a vegetable market, a lorry stand and a large number of private institutes and housing colonies are located on the two roads.

Tulheeri Road is treacherous and full of potholes and detours that make journey slow and painful. At one point, a bunch of trees makes the road treachery and the traffic coming from the opposite side cannot be seen.

“It has become an uphill task to reach Multan,” said Taseer Hassan, a student of the Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan. He said he used to spend 50 minutes to reach the university when the vehicles to Multan were not diverted to Alipur Road. He said now he had to live in Multan because of the fear that he might not miss his class.

A vehicle driver said that fare had been increased from Rs17 to Rs25 to compensate their time and fuel cost as they had to travel extra miles to reach Multan.

Multan-Muzaffargarh Road is a very busy route because transport from Sindh, Balochistan and the NWFP use this route to enter Multan and onward.

Tahir Habib from the Provincial Highway Authority said that his department had planned to build two bypasses both starting from the northern and southern sides of Basti Gujja near the Chenab River Bridge. The northern bypass would connect Muzaffargarh-Multan Road with DG Khan-Muzaffargarh Road near Nai Wala Tibba while the southern bypass would link Muzaffargarh-Multan Raod with Alipur-Muzaffargarh Road near Misali Public School.

He said the proposed bypasses would have facilitated the transport from and to DG Khan, Jhang, Layyah and Kot Addu and Multan. The plan was sent to the provincial highway secretary about two years ago with an estimated cost of Rs800 million. They have yet to receive any response.

He said now the construction would have increased due to an increase in the price of building material.

Another official of the highway department said that the PHA had red-taped the project.

Deputy Superintendent of Traffic Police Akram Niazi said that they had stopped the traffic from entering the city to give it a peaceful and clean look. But the decision did not help much, he said, adding that a bypass could help solve traffic problems of the city.