‘Repairing roads without planning for drainage wasting public money’

Every year Karachi drowns in rainwater. Every year the authorities remain apathetic towards people’s miseries. Unsurprisingly, this monsoon season is no different. One thing, however, has been extraordinary this year: damaged roads across the city.

What’s more concerning is the city administration’s helplessness in repairing the damaged roads. Not only the internal streets of the city but almost all the major thoroughfares have also suffered damages.

This situation has been resulting in massive traffic jams, which in turn has been causing millions of commuters to use a large amount of fuel as well as bear damages to their vehicles on a daily basis.

One of the most damaged thoroughfares of the city is University Road. It was reconstructed in 2017 at a cost of Rs884 million over a period of five and a half months.

Both tracks of the thoroughfare were turned into four-lane passages with a service road on either side. The width of the main carriageway on both sides of the road was made 13.8 metres, while the central median was made four metres wide.

Apart from that, a new sewerage infrastructure was laid, while sewage and storm water drains were also constructed. All these efforts have gone down the drain in the recent rainfall, which caused huge patches of the road to sink or break completely.

The road opposite the Safari Park near Samama doesn’t exist any more. University Road in front of the park is nearly inaccessible. At Nipa, a major bus stop seeing millions of cars pass by daily, huge ditches have formed in the road, bringing vehicles to a complete stop before they can move forward.

Gulistan-e-Jauhar resident Muhammad Ahmed said depressions have developed in several places on University Road, so the commuters have to be extra careful while driving. “Otherwise they can damage their vehicles by driving on uneven roads.”

The same University Road beyond the Civic Centre has been closed for traffic movement towards Jail Road, due to which the entire thoroughfare remains congested.

Likewise, there are huge ditches on Rashid Minhas Road that need to be immediately repaired. The road is in a bad condition at Shafiq Morr and Nipa, near the Aladin Amusement Park and towards Jauhar Morr.

Sir Shah Muhammad Suleman Road near the National Stadium and the Civic Centre has huge craters, and vehicles remain stranded there for hours. Ghania Ahmed lives near the stadium and leaves the house only in case of emergencies.

“University Road is inaccessible. At Shah Muhammad Suleman Road cars remain in a traffic jam for hours. How do I leave my home?” she said, adding that the authorities need to repair the road on an emergency basis.

She also said that if she books a cab, it takes over an hour for it to pick her up. “Then it takes over an hour to cross Shah Muhammad Suleman Road. Then it takes two hours to cross University Road. Which city am I living in?”

The situation is no different in the DHA neighbourhood, which once again flooded heavily due to poor drainage, and the roads developed massive potholes. Besides Khayaban-e-Ittehad, the worst rain-hit roads in the neighbourhood are in DHA Phase-I and Phase-IV.

“It’s been four or five days since DHA residents living at Khayaban-e-Rahat, Nishat and Bukhari have been confined to their homes,” said a resident named Ebad Ahmed.

“The water level has been such that cars broke down or created faults, like in the AC. Nishat is still flooded, and people living there have to cross the streets stepping in the rainwater mixed with sewage.”

Zainab lives in DHA Phase-VI, and since the recent rains have flooded the roads in the vicinity of her home, stepping out of the house has been a difficult chore.

“There’s water on all the roads around my house. Khayaban-e-Muslim has so much water that commuting has become a headache. I need a rickshaw just to cross the road because there’s so much water,” she pointed out.

“Cab drivers refuse to pick people up because they’re worried about getting water in their cars. A driver associated with a ride-hailing app that I normally use dropped me off the other day in front of an absolutely flooded lane because he was worried his car would break down,” she lamented.

“I was literally stranded! No car would come pick me up, and when it finally does, the ride costs me almost twice as much as it would normally cost.”

Korangi Road at Qayyumabad Chowrangi has also developed huge potholes that snarl up traffic for hours. The expressway that connects Qayyumabad and the Baloch Colony flyover has also broken at various points. Roads in the Korangi Industrial Area are also in a very bad shape, and Landhi is no exception either.

Under the World Bank-funded Karachi Neighbourhood Improvement Project, millions of rupees were spent to lay sewerage and storm water drain infrastructure in Saddar, the Zainab Market area and the adjoining localities. However, the recent monsoon showers not only inundated the streets of Saddar with rainwater and sewage but also caused huge potholes to appear, which has worsened the already congested traffic situation.

The NED Urban Infrastructure Department’s Dr Adnan Qadir told The News that even if the highest quality of material is used in the construction of a road, it will still be damaged in the absence of a proper rainwater drainage mechanism.

He stressed that a drainage mechanism on the side of every road is a must. He pointed out that the current drainage system in the city lacks the capacity to carry rainwater because it also carries wastewater.

He also criticised the carpeting and patchwork of damaged roads under way in the city. “Start from scratch!” he stressed, saying that if the roads are repaired without proper planning for drainage, all the repairs will be nothing more than a waste of the public’s money.

Karachi Administrator Barrister Murtaza Wahab, Karachi Metropolitan Corporation Municipal Commissioner Afzal Zaidi and Sindh Local Government Secretary Najam Ahmed Shah did not answer their phone despite repeated attempts to get in touch with them.