Residents demand overhead bridges for pedestrians’ safety

ISLAMABAD - The residents have made an appeal to the Capital Development Authority (CDA) to install overhead bridges over busy roads for safety of pedestrians.
People travelling on Faisal Avenue, Zero Point Interchange, 9th Avenue, 7th Avenue, IJ Principal Road, Islamabad Highway and Kashmir Highway have called for constructing pedestrian bridges at busy points on these roads.
Faisal Amin, a resident of G-8 Sector, said the pedestrian bridges would help reduce accidents on the roads, adding “you can see that a two-lane road has turned into a five-lane road because everybody wants to pass through it at the same time.” Muhammad Ramazan, a road safety campaigner claimed that many people lost their lives and got injured while crossing highways for lack of pedestrian bridges. He said that hundreds of people daily cross the busiest and speedy roads by putting their lives in danger. “Worse situations could be witnessed during peak hours at various locations when students, women and elderly people keep waiting for long time to safely cross the road,” he said.
Abdul Karim, a resident of Iqbal H-9, said, “The road is too wide to allow persons on foot to cross, and even at times, you see women with their little children crossing the road.” He said that billions of rupees have been spent in the capital on construction of new avenues to facilitate smooth traffic of flow, but little attention has been paid to the safety of pedestrians.
When contacted, a senior CDA official said that at some busy crossing points, the CDA had already constructed overhead bridges.
He said the problem at Zero Point would be resolved as pedestrian bridges would be built at four locations under Zero Point Interchange project.
The official said some alteration had been made in the design of the under-construction pedestrian bridge at Islamabad Highway and, instead of concrete, steel girders would be placed on it too. The modification had been made fearing any untoward incident due to width of the road.