Voices from the Street

To flyover or to go underground

Seeking solutions to ease congestion at the D.R. Wijewardene junction

By Roel Raymond

When three A grade highways; the A1 running from Colombo to Kandy, the Colombo-Wellawaya A2, and the Colombo-BatticaloaA4 twist in and inexplicably loop through Lotus Road, Colombo Fort, meeting, as they do at the AC6 - D. R. Wijewardena Mawatha; the resulting traffic congestion requires no explanation.

A series of painted, faded yellow crossings and three-tier lights are expected to mediate between pedestrian and vehicular traffic on the eight lanes that meet at the junction, but as the lights allow for no more than ten seconds to cross the road, bewildered pedestrians are left scrambling.

Chaos

While the situation appears untenable, especially to staff at the Observer whose offices overlook the patch of chaos in question, the DIG tasked with overseeing motor traffic, Amarasiri Senaratne, was of the opinion that traffic at this particular junction was no different to the traffic at any other junction in Colombo. The situation was in fact better than the situation at several of the other junctions in Colombo. Quote? This is potentially funny.

The pedestrians on site however appeared to disagree: Milton Marasinghe, a 50 year old gentleman was convinced something had to be done: “If you are on the Lake House side of the road you have to sprint, in about ten seconds, to reach the Regal Cinema, on the far side of the junction, I think its 50 meters away,” he said.

“People risk their lives in the process.”

Marasinghe felt the previous system – a roundabout (dismantled when?) – was a better way of dealing with the traffic. “Now vehicles come in from all directions,” he complained.

Another gentleman attempting the traitorous crossing, Kapila Wijeysundara, also chimed in favour of the roundabout. “Meka maha moda vedak,” (this is very foolish) he said. “The traffic now comes in from all directions. Before, when there was a roundabout, people used it.”

System

Sunil Pathirana however, who said he had used this particular junction for most of his adult life, working for over thirty years at a financial establishment in the vicinity, was not in favour of a return to the previous system, saying the roundabout had only caused more traffic.

“The present solution is good because it eases the traffic. The roundabout didn’t really allow for the right of way. But the lights system must be made to work for the pedestrians.

Now everything is a mess. The lights also don’t work. People run across, and people fall. Everything is a mess,” he said.

Lakmal Weerasekara offered a simpler solution to the problem. “What we need here, is not a roundabout,” he said. “The traffic police is only contributing to the problem, if the traffic lights are not working - as is often the case - and if there are too many people and vehicles on the road, we need to think about constructing either a flyover, or an underground network, like at Borella,” he said.

“That is the only way forward.”