Ring roads: Why city's lifelines are gridlocked

With a combined length of nearly 90 kilometers and forming two arterial loops through the heart of the Capital, Delhi's Ring Road and Outer Ring Road are vital to keeping its vast network of motor traffic in constant motion.

- Karn Pratap Singh and Snehil Sinha

NEW DELHI: But over the past fortnight, these lifelines have turned into chronic chokepoints, causing daily gridlocks for millions of motorists.

The reasons for the worsening traffic situation are manifold — construction activities by multiple civic agencies, encroachments, vehicle breakdowns, and rampant unauthorized parking. What makes matters worse is the sparse presence of traffic personnel at many critical points, making it nearly impossible to regulate flow or break logjams.

Experts say these overlapping issues can't be solved by a piecemeal approach. What's needed is a strategic overhaul of how Delhi governs and manages its traffic.

According to a Delhi Traffic Police survey last year, 134 stretches across the city were identified as congestion hotspots. At least 12 of these — including Savitri Flyover, Safdarjung Hospital, Majnu Ka Tila and Peeragarhi Chowk — are located along the Ring Road and Outer Ring Road.

"The Ring Road serves as a convergence point for five national highways (NH) — NH-1, NH-2, NH-8, NH-10, and NH-24 — which leads to frequent merging and diverging of traffic, creating conflict points," the traffic police's road crash report stated.

When HT drove the entire 87km stretch of the two roads on Tuesday afternoon — outside peak hours — it found widespread and persistent congestion.

Though the speed limit is 60 kmph, the average speed was under 20 kmph, and the full circuit took nearly five hours to complete. Even at a modest 45 kmph, the trip should have taken less than two hours. Traffic regulation was visible only at a handful of points — Dhaula Kuan, Chirag Delhi, IIT Flyover and Kashmere Gate ISBT. Elsewhere, chaos was largely left to a mix of road narrowing (from seven to as few as three lanes), absence of dedicated lanes for heavy and light vehicles, frequent breakdowns, encroachments, and flawed designs for the snarls.