Heavy showers on Thursday brought the city to its knees as normal life was crippled due to waterlogging on roads leading to traffic snarls on various routes. To add to commuters’ woes, traffic signals stopped working at many intersections.
The southwest monsoon has covered the entire country two days ahead of its normal date after reaching the last frontiers of Kutch and Western Rajasthan. According to India Meteorological Department’s (IMD), the country has so far received four per cent more rainfall than normal. All sub regions have been receiving good rainfall except the Northeast and east region of the country, where the deficiency has reached 23 per cent.
Around three-kilometre-long traffic jam was reported from DND to Ashram Chowk while severe congestion slowed down traffic movement on Ring Road and Outer Ring Road. Bumper-to-bumper traffic was also reported on NH24, Vikas Marg, August Kranti Marg and Mehrauli Badarpur Road.
It is interesting that most of the waterlogged areas are those which were identified by the Traffic Police and the details of which were sent to road-owning agencies way back in April. However, nothing seems to have changed on the ground.
“It took me around one hour just to travel from DND to South Extension. And the kind of traffic I witnessed behind me, I think I was lucky that I left work on time. I am sure those who came afterwards would have taken even much longer time to reach their destinations,” said Kranti Anand, who was travelling from Noida to Safdarjung.
Another commuter Nivi Shrivastava said, “Delhi rain can be really mean. I was on the road for one hour and had to come back to office again to wait till the traffic clears. Why can’t this city handle rainIJ God forbid but if there’s a flood-like situation here, everything will be shut for days.”
According to traffic police officials, traffic was obstructed in various locations, including Saket, Khanpur T-point, South Extension Part 1, Moolchand, Defence Colony underpass and Punjabi Bagh underpass due to waterlogging. The Twitter and Facebook timelines of Delhi Traffic Police reflected the state of Delhi as there were one-after-another alerts regarding traffic congestion due to waterlogging.
“Waterlogging at Savitri Cinema, from Savitri to Chirag Delhi, from Savitri to Greater Kailash, Jahangirpuri metro station… Obstruction in traffic in the carriageways from Hamdard towards Khanpur due to waterlogging…
Traffic is heavy on MB Road at Sainik Farm gate no. 1 and 2 due to waterlogging… Traffic is heavy on Outer Ring Road (Panchsheel, IIT, Munirka and Vasant Vihar) due to waterlogging,” Delhi Traffic Police tweeted one after another.
However, many commuters complained that waterlogging was only half the problem as many traffic signals had also malfunctioned which added to the already-existing chaos.
“It’s a shame that in the national Capital, we do not have proper drainage system to ensure that roads are not waterlogged due to rain. It is even a bigger shame that the national Capital does not even have technology to ensure that traffic lights function smoothly when they are needed the most. It is a common-known fact that Delhi faces traffic chaos even during light showers. But the Government has done nothing to ensure that traffic lights keep functioning properly or that roads are not waterlogged whenever it happens,” said Deepak Malhotra, a resident of Pitampura.
As per estimates, almost 30 to 40 per cent of the 864 signalised intersections face problems during the monsoons due to cables getting damaged by rainwater or due to power failure as the proposals to install inverters or solar panels remained on paper.
According to traffic officials, the number of traffic complaints related to civic issues sees a significant spike during the monsoon season. There are problems like potholes, uprooting of trees, caving-in of roads and waterlogging, which lead to slowdown of traffic.