Traffic snarls likely to worsen in Thiruvananthapuram

Traffic snarls in the State capital are likely to worsen with the start of the Legislative Assembly session on Friday, the city police said.

Officials said they expected a daily tide of protest marches and demonstrations to converge on the Legislative Assembly and the Secretariat, effectively denying vehicular access to the heart of the city during rush hours till March 27, when the session concluded.

Traffic enforcers point out that even a small procession on the congested Mahatma Gandhi Road causes traffic to move at a snail’s pace on the Kesavadasapuram-East Fort stretch, primarily.

The traffic volume in the capital is bourgeoning and already exceeds the available road space by at least 250 per cent.

Several arterial stretches in the city have been closed for laying pipelines, some for repairing ruptured water mains and others for resurfacing.

For instance, one track of the arterial LMS-Vellayambalam road has been dug up to lay pipelines.

The busy Edapazhanji-Kochar-Pangode road has been closed to vehicular traffic to construct two culverts to regulate storm-water flow in the locality.

The police recently stopped the daytime surfacing of the Ulloor-PMG road, a crowded stretch where there are at least three major schools and several private tutorials having more than 3,000 students.

The police said the contractor had failed to comply with their request to do the resurfacing at night. It seemed the contractor could ill-afford the wages for night work demanded by his employees, an official said.

Assistant Commissioner, Traffic, R. Mahesh said the police had no choice but to restrict parking near schools, markets, shopping localities, cinemas and marriage halls to free available road space to vehicular movement.

For one, motorists will be allowed to park only on the left side of the Kuravankonam-Pattom road, which the police now use as a bypass to ease traffic snarls when other stretches get clogged. In designated parking areas, vehicles should be parked parallel to the footpath and not in an angle.

Persons, including traders, motorists, street vendors and owners of wayside eateries, who appropriate foot-path space for their private purposes will be prosecuted on the charge of impeding traffic movement.