Parmeshwar Devkota

Traffic management is one of the big challenging tasks in any metropolis. It shows that city’s image. If the traffic system is chaotic, it creates disorder on the road, with disruption in the commuters’ routine works. One of the serious things is that if you get home late owing to the traffic congestion, you may come under your spouse’s scrutiny.
With the fear for COVID-19 on the wane, the traffic management of the Kathmandu Valley has been getting complicated each passing day. This is chiefly because the valley, as the centre of education, business, politics and health, is turning into a mega city. A decade ago or so, we could see many chunks of farm land in between Kathmandu and Lalitpur.
Similarly, a huge portion of farm land and open space was found along both sides of the Manohara River which separates Kathmandu from Bhaktapur. But, today the open fields and farm lands have almost been displaced with concrete jungles. The rapid urbanisation shows that the population of Kathmandu, Lalitpur and Bhaktapur districts has been on the rise at an alarming rate.
But the way the valley is being managed today has remained as it was decades ago. A variety of wholesale and retail markets are sprawling around Naya Sadak, Indrachowk and Asan of Kathmandu. Along with that, the mind-set of people in these three districts is that they prefer visiting the aforementioned markets. On the other hand, the campaigns launched by non-governmental organisations and political parties do not complete without staging a protest around Ratna Park as well as in those marketplaces.
Keeping this in mind, the traffic management system should have been developed to avoid the chronic jam. It has become mandatory for every vehicle to go around Ratna Park, which causes huge traffic jam during working hours daily. The office-goers, lactating mothers and local people suffer much. If foreigners fall into such jam, they may defame the name of the city as well as the country.
Here are some suggestions to overcome this persistent problem. There should be four parking lots around Ratna Park for public vehicles only. The public vehicles operating from the northeast side should be stationed at Kamaladi and Tindhara Pathasala areas. The same running form the northwest should be parked at Kantipath and Tridevi Marga areas. The public vehicles coming from Bhaktapur and Lalitpur to Kathmandu should be parked near the head office of Nepal Telecom. Similarly, the vehicles bound to Thankot and Kirtipur should be stationed at Tripureshwore and Bhadragoal.
If you visit places mentioned above, you will find that them being mostly unused. There is also public property in all those areas. At Jamal-Kanthipath section road, a hoarding board written ‘Property of Tribhuban University’ is being hung.
At the other side of Jamal lie Trichandra College and Tindhara Pathsala, which are age-old government education institutions. They can donate a certain chunk of land to enhance the city’s beauty as well as the nation’s image. If you visit the Bhadrakali-Tripureshwor road, you can find it sufficient for this. If necessary, the Ministry of Health and Population can donate some land located on its back side. This will help manage the traffic system of these three historically important cities.
If the policymakers of these locations step up measures accordingly, they themselves will stand to benefit. They can get home in time.