PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Tuesday directed the Peshawar Development Authority’s director general to respond to a petition seeking a ban on heavy vehicular traffic, including container trucks, in some residential areas of Hayatabad Township, Peshawar.

A bench consisting of Justice Lal Jan Khattak and Justice Abdul Shakoor issued the order after holding a preliminary hearing into the petition of a resident of Hayatabad Sector D-5, Iftikhar Ahmad Malik, who requested the court to direct the respondents, including PDA DG, to stop the entry of heavy traffic to Section D-5.

The court will announce the next hearing schedule later. The petitioner requested the court to ask the PDA to construct street height barrier on all entry and exit points of Hayatabad Township streets, especially those leading to Phase-I of Sector D-5.

He also sought the court’s order for not allowing heavy traffic in the sector until the disposal of the petition.

The respondents in the petition include the provincial government through chief secretary, local government secretary, PDA director general, senior superintendent of police (traffic), and station house officer of the Hayatabad police station.

Kamran Qaisar, lawyer for the petitioner, said a residential plot measuring one kanal was allotted by the PDA to his client in 1979.

He said on the complaint of the residents of Hayatabad sectors D-4 and D-5 in 2002-03, the PDA’s director general had allowed the construction of street height barrier at the entrance point to Hayatabad Industrial Estate in D-5, Phase-I, to ban heavy traffic in the area.

The lawyer said the Hayatabad Township had three designated main heavy vehicular traffic roadways entry and exit points, which included entrance from Ring Road, PDA Road and Phase-III Road.

He added that Phase-I of Hayatabad consisted of sectors D4 and D5, which were adjacent to the industrial estate.

The lawyer said a steel barrier had been there for two to three years but lack of maintenance damaged it, so heavy vehicles, including container trucks, began plying the road for entering or exiting the industrial estate.

He claimed that every year, the PDA had been allocating millions of rupees for the rehabilitation and modernisation of the infrastructure of industrial estate and Hayatabad but since 2006, it had turned a blind eye to the request of the petitioner and other residents for the construction of the street barrier at the entrance point of Street No 1, Sector D-5, to prevent heavy vehicular traffic.

The lawyer claimed that the life of residents, including the petitioner, had become miserable due to illegal heavy traffic and they suffered from multiple diseases, while the value of their houses had declined.

He added that traffic jams were common in the area due to the presence of heavy vehicles on narrow roads.

Published in Dawn, October 16th, 2019