Fog hits road traffic

Fog hits road traffic

Rajiv Bhatia

Zirakpur, January 7
With fog engulfing the region, especially in the early and late night hours, traffic on the stretch between Zirakpur-Lalru on the Chandigarh-Ambala national highway continues to move at snail’s pace due to poor visibility.

Traffic on the Zirakpur-Patiala road and the Zirkapur-Panchkula road has also been affected.

Commuters are facing hard times crossing the stretch, especially during night.

They complained that the four-laning of the highway had been of little help as streetlights were not functioning and trucks parked by the roadside also caused inconvenience.

A commuter claimed that streetlights from Sharma farm house to Dera Bassi railway overbridge were not functional, causing difficulty in locating vehicles moving ahead or those crossing the median.

Travelling on the highway during night was not easy as traffic moved at slow speed due to low visibility. Cyclists and pedestrians were the toughest to sight.

In the absence of streetlights on the entrance to Zirkapur, commuters faced difficulty in crossing the stretch till the flyover.

Also, dust on self-illuminating indicators along the edge of the road made things more difficult for motorists.

Visibility went down to a few metres from Chhat lights to Dera Bassi railway overbridge.

The work on widening of Zirkapur-Kalka highway was also posing problems for motorists.

“I had returned from Patiala and it took me five hours to reach here,” said Kapil, a resident of Zirakpur.

Fog was so dense that it was difficult to even judge the speed of your vehicle, he said.

Bus passengers also faced inconvenience due to the fog.

Vipin Sharma, a resident of Karnal, said he had been waiting for bus for the past two hours but most buses were apparently running late.

Buses usually ran on regular intervals for his destination but fog had affected travel time as well as the frequency of buses, he added.