Acouple of years ago, it was unimaginable that there’d ever be traffic jams in the Frazer Town area. It’s a very different scene now. With the ITC railway bridge being closed for the construction of the flyover over it, the traffic police have had to reroute traffic — the Mosque Road bridge is a one-way out of Richards Town and the Frazer Town police station underpass is a one-way into it, while the Tannery Road underpass remains twoway. But that seems to have caused bigger problems.
Jammed
Anyone who wants to cross the tracks to get to Pottery Road has only two options: the Mosque Road bridge and the Tannery Road underpass. “I need to get to Hutchins Road and I always used to take bridge and that never took more than five minutes,” says content writer Mithali Ghosh, “but now I get stuck in a jam on Mosque Road for as long as twenty minutes.” The pileup starts from the circle and can go all the way up to Bethesda Church. This also poses a problem for motorists going towards Coles Road because the other side of the road is blocked with vehicles going the other way.
And it’s not just Mosque Road; even MM road on either side of the circle is congested. “People are stuck as far down as Everest Theatre. And in order to avoid being stuck on Mosque Road, people take a detour from Coles Road on to Stephen’s Road and come on to MM Road. This just adds to the confusion,” says Mohammed Farooq, owner of a restaurant on Mosque Road. “In fact, the smaller roads that used to be so empty and quiet are now like main roads.”
No way out
Since the smaller roads are also jammed, motorists have no choice but to cool their heels in traffic. “I once had cross the bridge to drop a friend home,” recalls student Jason Vaz, “and when we saw the traffic from the top of Coles Road, we decided to take a left off Mosque Road on to Robertson Road and get to the Tannery Road underpass. But even that road was blocked as far down as GK Vale, so we turned, got back to Mosque Road and she walked back. It was only 8 pm, so it wasn’t unsafe.”
But what happens in the case of an emergency? “You can’t do anything,” says Farooq, “One evening we saw a woman in labour stuck in an auto. We got her out of it and got someone to take a roundabout route to get her to a clinic. There are days when we see ambulances in stuck in jams too.”
There are other dangers on the narrow bridge, adds Mithali. “There’s a smaller road that leads straight on to the bridge and now people are using it to avoid the pile-up at the circle. That’s dangerous because you’re suddenly faced with more vehicles on the bridge, which is too narrow to take so many vehicles,” she says.
What meter?
“Living on the wrong side of the tracks is given a new meaning when you ask auto drivers to take you to Cooke Town, Richards Town or beyond,” says Richards Town resident Ambika Singh. “They never liked crossing the tracks in the evenings and almost always asked for extra fare, but now with the traffic situation on Mosque Road, they don’t even want to come there because they’ll have a problem getting out of it.”
Like Jason says, it’s just easier and faster to walk. “Now that there’s more traffic in the area, using the walkway over the bridge isn’t that creepy anymore,” says student Radhika Bhat.
WHAT ARE THE COPS DOING?
Before the bridge and underpass were made one-ways, there was hardly any need for cops to direct traffic. However, now there are as many as three traffic policemen at the Mosque Road circle. One cop, under condition of anonymity, says, “It’s difficult to direct traffic in this area because of the increased flow.”
Traffic piled up at the Mosque Road circle
