Police try to find solution for traffic jam on the highway

Maldives Pollice Service has said that they are discussing ways to keep the highway connected to Sinamale’ Bridge clear if any incident were to occur on the highway.

Thousands of trips are made daily on the highway.  Highway traffic increases manifold, especially during official hours and holidays.

Traffic blockage on the highway is usually caused by an accident. The car lane is blocked for a long time due to the time it takes to remove the vehicle involved in the accident. And then the vehicles behind have to wait without continuing on the road.

In the event of a major accident, traffic is blocked for several hours. Several cars and public transport buses were stranded in a long queue due to an accident yesterday.

Speaking to  Sun, Chief Inspector Mohamed Luthufee, who is in charge of traffic management on the Hulhumale-Hulhule Highway, said the police are currently discussing how to solve the traffic problem in such situations.

“It took almost two hours for the forklift to arrive and remove the vehicles involved in yesterday’s accident. This is a lot of time. We are discussing to find temporary solutions to these kinds of cases,” Luthufee said.

However, he noted that it would be difficult to find a permanent solution.

“The solution for now is, if one side of the highway is blocked, to change the other side to a way lane. If its from the Hulhumale end, then from there. If it's from the Male’ end, we control the flow of vehicles onto the bridge,” he said.

He said police would be present and be monitoring if a situation arose that would require a one-way lane to be temporarily changed to a two-way lane. He said that as vehicles drive very fast on the highway, this will only be done if completely necessary.