Dehiwela traffic mess: Common sense needed to find solution
The traffic jam in Dehiwela from the Hospital Road junction upto the Station Road junction, is terrible, to say the least. Compared to Wellawatte and Mount Lavinia, the traffic here practically comes to a standstill at peak times. It is so bad, that nowadays people hate to take their own vehicles and opt for Uber/Pick me etc which in turn increases the traffic on the road. The situation has become so bad that people do not like to rent or buy houses in Dehiwela anymore.
It is time someone, especially the Traffic Police stop and think about the reasons for this. Actually the main reason is someone’s dumb idea of blocking most of the – or all of the - breaks in the boullards where vehicles can take a U turn or cross over to go into a side lane. This means someone coming up to the Hospital junction travelling towards Mount Lavinia has to go all the way up to Station Road and vice versa for the traffic travelling in the opposite direction. Why haven’t the Traffic Police – not even one of them – realized that this stupid idea doubles, triples or multiplies the number of the vehicles travelling both ways in Dehiwela.
I wrote to the newspaper about this almost ten years back asking whether anybody had done a trial study of leaving some of these blocked gaps open and to station a traffic policeman at these places, who can direct the vehicles to take a U turn or to crossover to the opposite side when the incoming traffic is stopped, due to red traffic lights. The OIC/ Traffic at that time, responded through the newspaper itself, that even if they did a study, THEY KNOW that it will not help! So much for scientific methods of solving problems in Sri Lanka. So for 10 years or more this circus continues.
Can we expect common sense to prevail at least at this late stage?
Incidentally, Ramanadhan Avenue which connects 2nd Lane Dehiwela to Frazer Avenue and provides an alternate route to the Marine Drive is so full of pot- holes that many motorists prefer to suffer the terrible traffic jam on Galle Road rather than take this side road. The torrential rain obviously made the situation even worse. Will some authority please look into this too?
Dr.Mareena Thaha Reffai Dehiwela