Karachi’s traffic police have put a new diversion plan in place for motorists travelling through the Garden and Nishtar Road areas, where construction work has now begun on a series of flyover projects. The plan covers busy roads in central Karachi, and drivers heading through the area from tonight will need to follow the alternative routes set out by the police or risk long delays.
According to the traffic police, the stretch of road from Goodluck Marriage Hall to Jaman Shah Mazar will remain closed from tonight while the work continues. The closure sits at the heart of the Garden corridor, a route used every day by commuters travelling between the older parts of the city, Saddar and the Lyari Expressway, and the police have asked motorists to plan their journeys around it rather than trying to push through the closed section.
Traffic arriving from Pak Colony and from the Lyari Expressway has been directed towards Orange Street as its main alternative. From there, motorists can reach Nishtar Road through De Silva Street and take a U-turn near Jaman Shah Mazar to continue their journey. Traffic heading towards Saddar, meanwhile, will be allowed to use Aga Khan III Road, keeping one of the main approaches to the city’s commercial centre open while the construction work goes on around it.
The plan also sets out two alternative routes for motorists travelling from Murad Khan Chowk. One route runs through Shalimar Street to Fawara Chowk, from where drivers can use Orange Street and Lalu Line Road to reach Manghopir Road. The second route runs through Garden Official Street towards Jilani Chowk and Dhobi Ghat, giving drivers heading in that direction a way around the closed stretch without being forced back into the main construction area. Heavy traffic has been given its own diversion, with vehicles redirected from Bara Board towards Nazimabad, Gulbahar and Lasbela, while vehicles heading towards Gurumandir and MA Jinnah Road will also have to use alternative routes for the duration of the work.
Traffic police officers and personnel will be deployed at all of the diversion points to guide commuters and keep traffic moving through the narrower alternative streets. A spokesperson for the traffic police has advised citizens to use the alternative routes and to follow the instructions of the personnel on duty. The alternative streets around Garden are narrow in places, and even a small number of drivers ignoring the diversions can quickly block the very routes meant to keep traffic flowing.
The diversions are the latest visible stage of a project that has been in preparation for months. In August this year, the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation announced plans for a new flyover at the Nishtar Road and Garden Chowrangi junction, at an estimated cost of around one billion rupees. Karachi Mayor Murtaza Wahab announced the project while chairing a meeting of the municipal engineering department, directing officials to complete the technical and administrative formalities quickly so that construction could begin at the earliest possible stage. Municipal Commissioner Abrar Jaffer told that meeting that the project was targeted for completion within one year, although the final timeline would depend on when the construction contract was awarded.
The planned flyover is designed to connect the Lyari Expressway with Garden Road and Nishtar Road, creating a more direct corridor towards Saddar, the Old City and the surrounding commercial areas. City officials have argued that the junction is one of the most congested in central Karachi, and that a flyover there would take pressure off the surrounding roads that thousands of commuters and traders use every day. The corridor matters well beyond the Garden neighbourhood itself: it links central and southern Karachi, carries traffic between Nazimabad, Garden, Saddar and the Old City, and serves shoppers and traders heading to commercial centres and attractions such as the Karachi Zoo, which draws large crowds, particularly at weekends.
For commuters, however, the immediate reality is disruption before improvement. Construction on a busy urban corridor almost always means narrower roads, slower movement and unfamiliar routes, and the Garden diversion plan is no exception. The alternative streets named by the police, from Orange Street and De Silva Street to Shalimar Street and Garden Official Street, are residential and commercial streets that were not built for the volume of traffic that normally uses the main road. That is why the police have placed personnel at the diversion points, and why the spokesperson’s advice to follow their instructions matters more than it might sound.
In the longer term, the city administration will hope that the short-term inconvenience pays off. If the Nishtar Road and Garden flyover is completed on anything close to its one-year target, the junction that today needs a full diversion plan could become one of the smoother crossings in central Karachi, carrying traffic between the Lyari Expressway, Saddar and the Old City without the daily bottleneck that commuters currently endure. Until then, the diversion plan is the route through, and the police appeal stands: use the alternative roads, follow the officers on duty, and give the work the space it needs to finish.
