NEW DELHI: Burari residents have been forced to endure long traffic congestions as a result of the ongoing construction of a sewer line by the Delhi Jal Board in the area. With roads like the Sant Nagar Marg that serve as major arteries being choked up, everyone from office-goers to schoolchildren has been severely affected.
The construction work has been going on for over a year now, progressing at a snail’s pace, moving from one segment to the other. As the area is located close to the floodplains of the Yamuna River, the soil is quite weak, leading to multiple collapses that further slow down construction work.
The unplanned and spread-out nature of the work covers up most of the roads, leaving commuters with very little space to navigate. “My daily commute across Burari used to take me less than an hour. The same route now takes almost three hours to complete,” said Prakash Mishra, a resident of Baba colony.
The area is home to several large hospitals, but patients have to face major difficulty in reaching these hospitals. “My daughter’s health severely deteriorated last month and she needed to be taken to the hospital in an ambulance. But because of the condition of the road, it took us a long time to reach the hospital and her condition worsened rapidly,” said Vandana Singh, a resident of Sant Nagar.
Residents have also repeatedly raised complaints about the parking facilities in the area. “People are left with no choice but to park on the side of the roads, which only makes the traffic situation worse,” said Narendra, another resident of the area.
Despite recent improvements in Burari’s public transit system, such as the addition of new DTDC buses, the area has also seen increased traffic in recent years as a result of an influx of new migrants.