The planners of Moenjodaro and Persepolis not being available for consultation, I have conferred with Vice-Chancellor of the NED University Abul Kalam, Professor of transport engineering at the NEDU Fahim Ahsan, and Engineer Roland deSouza, a graduate of the NEDU.

Karachi has received approximately 20 inches of rainfall this summer - of which three inches fell on the afternoon and evening of Monday, July 28. For the past half century Karachi's average annual rainfall has been nine inches with a three-inch average for the month of July.

Screaming headlines in our press last week repeatedly informed us about how life in Karachi was paralyzed, with so many dead and so many electrocuted, how the skies had opened up and led to chaos, that all low-lying areas were inundated, adding to the miseries of the low-income groups who had been hard hit by the rainfall the previous week, and that the traffic on all the main arterial routes was clogged - in short, mayhem reigned.

Many traffic jams lasted all night long and unlucky commuters from the outskirts could do little but spend the night sleeping in their cars on Sharea Faisal. One friend of mine whose flight landed at 2130 at the Jinnah airport arrived home at 0800 hours the following morning, and, reportedly, the deputy inspector-general of the traffic police managed to get into his bed at 0600.

A repeated headline in the press after each downpour of rain, each year, tells us that 'rains expose construction quality of roads.' Now, some 20 to 30 per cent of urban land area in our cities is covered with highways, roads and circulation paths, Karachi, with over a million vehicles on its roads, being one city.

This year our new city Nazim, Naimatullah, appeared on the TV screens to carefully explain to us that it is not the roads constructed during his tenure that have been damaged by the rain, but those poorly constructed thoroughfares laid down by previous municipal administrators. Naimatullah has an allocation of Rs.2.1 million for repair and upkeep of the hundreds of square kilometers of damaged roads in this city - nowhere near enough considering the normal deplorable state of the roads when the weather is dry.

Unless some more money is found, together with honest and reliable contractors and competent road builders who know what is what when it comes to roads and their drainage requirements, the traffic system of Karachi, 'the economic engine of Pakistan', will continue to limp along when it does not rain and collapse when it does, at considerable cost to the development of the country.

Professor Higgins had it that 'the rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain.' This may be so, but in the rest of the world it falls far more in the cities. NASA researchers, who have used a rainfall-measuring satellite, confirm that 'urban heat-islands' create more summer rain over and downwind of major cities worldwide.

From time immemorial, cities and buildings have been equipped with storm drainage systems and sanitary sewerage systems. The storm drainage system helps prevent flooding by diverting rain and melted snow, and the sewerage systems are there to protect public health and the environment by collecting and treating waste water from houses, schools, hospitals, businesses, industries, etc.

For the storm drainage, a master plan has to be drawn up showing the levels and slopes of all land and areas within urban limits and an engineering strategy and design are developed to ensure that the worst precipitation (over a set period of years) is safely carried away to a nearby river, lake or the sea. This is mainly based on the natural fall-off of the land, as it has existed over centuries.

Part of the strategy is the administration and implementation of storm drainage regulations, the control changes and improvements in streets, roads, curbs, plot and land development inlets, gullies, pipes, culverts, and channels, and ensuring that all are efficiently maintained and cleaned (it is against the law to alter the flow of storm water).

Efficient drainage of surface water is critical for city roads, as saturated soils do not have the stability and load-bearing capacity to support modern highways carrying heavy traffic. Excess water from rainfall, a high water table, or local flooding creates problems in the pavement structure because of buoyancy of materials in the saturated layer and the reduction of friction forces between soil particles. This creates a loss of bearing capacity of the base, sub-base and sub-grade materials. Impact from wheel loads creates excess water pressures, excess water causes erosion of the base material, and the useful life of a road is reduced.

In the cities of developed countries, the roads, curbs and gutters or roadside ditches are all part of the minor drainage system. Roads are also part of the major drainage system and are subject to certain limitations. When the flow in a road exceeds allowable limits, a storm sewer system or a channel is required to convey the excess flows. The primary function of roads being traffic movement, the drainage function is subservient and must not interfere with the traffic function of the road.

Even our high-powered organizations, supposedly manned by trained and capable administrators and engineers, are incapable of constructing a proper road. The Frontier Works Organization under contract with the Karachi Port Trust and the Karachi Municipal Corporation completed Mai Kolachi causeway (and called it a bypass) in 1995. Running through the Chinna Creek Eastern Backwaters of the harbour, there should have been no problem at all with keeping this causeway drained, dry and free of stagnant water.

But no, as it stands today, it is a mess. Owing to inadequate slopes, cambers and drainage provisions, water has amassed in patches all along the causeway and is progressively destroying the hardtop. Drainage pipes from the main road to the service lanes were laid as an afterthought, breaking up the pedestrian pavements. Non-existent maintenance plus additional excavation work to lay gas pipes along the length of the causeway (which has not been repaired) has exacerbated the situation.

A mega-city like Karachi is in dire need of a Disaster Commissioner (not a serving or retired cavalry man, foot soldier, or gunner), a high-powered qualified official capable of planning for and coping with natural and man-made calamities that befall us, such as rain, floods, cyclones, earthquakes, fires, epidemics.

Under his charge should be all the emergency services (fire engines, ambulances, rescue teams, etc), and the coordination and functioning of hospitals, police, city administration, public utilities, transport and communication services, and, most importantly, he should be required to conduct regular practice drills so that municipal workers and citizens know what to do during disasters. Our present civil defence, fire department, and ambulance services are totally uncoordinated and unable to cope.

The one good deed done by former governor of Sindh and thus Chancellor of Nadirshaw Eduljee Dinshaw University of Engineering and Technology was to appoint Engineer Abul Kalam as vice-chancellor of the university. I happen to be a member of the syndicate, and it is a pleasure working with Kalam. He answers the telephone on the first ring, he is decisive and efficient. I asked him two days ago whether we should consider running a short course to educate the nazims, and the civilian or military appointees and teach them the basics of road-building, how water seeks its own level, and so forth. His immediate answer was "Yes." He thought for a second, and then asked: "But which of the 'experts' will turn up?"