Traffic jams, snap checking, tension in the air — that’s Ideas 2004 for you. The introduction of helicopters might be the solution for Ideas 2005
WHAT was the most memorable thing of TV series Star Trek? Mr Spock’s pointy ears or that one word that would transport the crew members from the ship to elsewhere and back ... Energize! There they would stand in the transporter, press a button, and lo and behold ... they would be transported to wherever it was they were supposed to go ... no fuss!
When, oh when, will it become a reality? Not too long ago, we read a news item telling us that scientists had made headway into development of something similar. Technically, a transporter is a device that converts matter into energy and then back to matter again. In this way, energy can be moved from one place to another through a beam rather than having to pick the thing up and carry it wherever you want to put it.
And how we poor hapless Karachiites wouldn’t like an access to something like this. Imagine all the VVIPS being transported to and from their place of preference through a beam (bear in mind, sometimes, despite the sophistication, even in Star Trek, the molecules used to go hither and thither in the space and the person couldn’t ‘come together,’ so to say). Ah well, that is just a thought ... We should be so lucky!
Now since that is just wishful thinking, how about the next best alternatives. Since the Nazim is so busy building roads and parks right, left and centre, how about making it mandatory for exhibition sites like the Expo centre, plus all the big hotels and conference centres, where these ‘dignitaries’ usually descend, to have places marked as helipads? Let them take the aerial route and leave poor commuters and pedestrians in peace.
This mode of commuting will also take the pressure off the security agencies who are looking high and low for devices under cars and motorcycles. Now they will only have to look for the big stuff. Seriously, more helicopter used by the VVIPS will make life simpler all around. That is, for them, the security-wallahs, and also the citizens who will be able to move around their city as a matter of right rather than a favour bestowed upon them by the powers that be.
After all, the above-mentioned places are just about where these traffic blockers go to ... It isn’t as if they will have to go into the thick of Lyari to assess the poverty and drug problems there, or have to venture into Orangi to see what problems water shortage causes, or venture into the slums inhabited by the dispossessed and marginalized. It is in places such as these that terrestrial transport is needed. Elsewhere, they can just as well go up and away and earn the unending duas of the masses who have been spared the traffic nightmare that their visits subject the citizens to.
So Nazim sahib, how about it? Some more helipads here, there and everywhere please. After all, they do not even require special construction ... most places will just need markings, albeit after testing the strength of the surface of course.
And while you are at it, how about doing something about the long standing complaint, nay, plea of the Karachiites ... though admittedly, this would take some doing. Earmark an off-shore island as the diplomatic enclave of the city, and move those white elephants known as consulates there. A dedicated place will allow a better management of their security issues, and threats to their security, real and perceived, will not make life a misery for the people of this city who are being offered absolutely no service by these consulates.
No disrespect to the guests and visitors here, but please let Karachi remain for the benefit of the Karachiites. Events and shows are feathers in the cap of this wonderful city that always opens its hearts to visitors, national and international. But the chaos and misery its citizens were subjected to during the recently concluded Ideas 2004 exhibition (and this isn’t the first time they have had to endure this) has made the need to search for a solution all the more urgent.
People were either stranded for hours or had to follow a very circuitous route to get to and from their homes and places of work. To top it all, the security exercises they were subjected to, howsoever necessary, has swelled the ranks of the grumblers. It isn’t as if life is any less chaotic here and we do not have traffic bottlenecks at the slightest of pretext. But what can be avoided should be.
Traffic jams, snap checking, tension in the air — that’s Ideas 2004 for you. The introduction of helicopters might be the solution for Ideas 2005
