Hyderabad: Traffic movement at Road No. 45 of Jubilee Hills is set to get smoother as the traffic police on Monday identified a U-turn under the Jubilee Hills flyover as the key bottleneck and decided to disallow buses and other larger vehicles from using the turn.
Joint commissioner of traffic police A.V. Ranganath said, “Earlier, it used to take 20-25 minutes to cover two kilometres (from Banjara Hills Road No. 2). The police are making efforts to minimise the commute time.”
“The prime cause for conjunction is the small U–turn. Buses and other long vehicles will be diverted to the U-turn, which is a few metres ahead,” Ranganath said.
The police said they came to the conclusion after making daily visits, undertaking the commute and conducting an empirical study at the field level. They calculated the time taken by commuters to reach from junction to junction and identified conjunction points from the data collected through CCTV footage earlier and during the ongoing trial.
“Our officials also collected opinions of the general public and forecasts from local traffic police posted on the road. We will come to a final conclusion on this Saturday,” Ranganath said.
“We aim to minimise commute time between Banjara Hills Road No. 12 and Jubilee Hills Road No. 45 by more than 70 per cent. Later, we will increase the duration of the green signals towards Madhapur and towards Panjagutta,” Ranganath said.
The traffic police said the U-turn plan was already in place at Mehdipatnam, wherein bikes and cars use the first U-turn, while buses, goods vehicles and other big vehicles are allowed to take the second U-turn. “This has resolved 70 per cent of the conjunction on the Mehdipatnam-Rethibowli stretch on both ways,” a police official said.
The trial
On Day 1, traffic police shut four signals at Filmnagar, Journalist Colony, Jubilee Hills Road No. 45 and Jubilee Hills checkpost.
Diversions implemented
Starting Saturday, buses and heavy vehicles were allowed to take the U-turn below the Jubilee Hills flyover and will be diverted to the second U-turn. The first U-turn will be for only small vehicles, including cars and motorbikes, the police said.
Enforcement
Over 40 traffic personnel are deployed on the stretch from the Jubilee Hills checkpost towards the Croma establishment. Commuters using this road will be diverted to take a left towards the cable bridge. The traffic police will be deputing more than 50 personnel to make commuters aware of diversions.
