I’m sorry to go on about the traffic, the last resort of a blog scoundrel, but I can’t help it. It’s been a fact of life ever since we first moved out to the Emirates, back when the Sharjah/Dubai road traffic could get so bad that you could be held up in queues for at least 15 minutes. Scandalous, eh?
But today’s traffic. Now, that’s really traffic. We’re talking about two hour bumper to bumper snarl-ups that are starting at 6am and lasting 3 or 4 hours. Aggressive lane-swapping, frustration and general bad-temperedness make the whole process, for those that endure it, a twice-daily joy. It’s the world’s ‘Dubai talking point’, although poor old Sharjah is fast eclipsing Dubai for sheer traffic hell, despite the RTA’s efforts.
Now Sharjah Police has closed the exit from the infamous National Paints roundabout, forcing any traffic wishing to exit the Emirates Road at that point to take the Mileha Road, which is already partially blocked by roadworks and reduced to a single lane. This then feeds up through the Univesity City, a road restricted by frequent large speed bumps. An alternative is the U-turn in front of Sharjah English school and the feeder road that goes from the previous Emirates Road junction through the industrial area and past the school. Result: a school mired in awful, dangerous levels of confused traffic. It was madness as people tried to muddle through, jostling for some way to get back to their route home.
According to Gulf News’ story on the move today, it is a ‘trial’ to ‘estimate traffic movement’.
So it was ‘a trial’ to see what would happen if you closed the congested National Paints roundabout and re-routed the traffic through roads themselves blocked by roadworks.
An experiment.
I wonder what’ll happen if I bash myself on the head repeatedly with this large meat tenderising hammer? *whamwhamwhamwham*. Interesting. It appears to be causing not inconsiderable pain...
Am I the only person around here thinking that perhaps if they had told people they were going to do this first, if they had proper signage announcing and directing the diversion and if they had announced the move to the public with an awareness campaign, then the initial consequences would have been at least slightly less traumatic?
National Paints is a fine company and its products are most excellent. But avoid its roundabout...
3 comments:
i'm glad i graduated already.
It is never too boring to talk about Dubai's traffic. This sounds horrible.
Yep, all the usual problems asociated with incompetent and arrogant management.
A totally unnecessary 'experiment', don't tell anyone you're going to do it, erect no signage, just do what you want to do and let the public sort out the mess you put them in.
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