Noida’s party spirit takes toll on traffic as early as 5pm

NOIDA: The first day of 2019 saw even more busy traffic around Sector 18 than New Year’s Eve, with thousands of commuters visiting malls in sectors 18 and 38A. Traffic slowed down near the U-turn towards the The Great India Place (TGIP) mall, and vehicles lined up on the carriageway from Film City till Sector 18.
Vehicular movement slowed down as early as 5pm. Cars could be seen parked on both the carriageways of the Maharaja Agrasen Marg.

While diversions were in place for e-rickshaws, auto-rickshaws and cycle-rickshaws on the stretch between the Atta Chowk and Atta Peer on Monday, no such diversions were in place on Tuesday, adding to the chaos.

On Monday, traffic police had declared the area around malls “no parking zones”, but commuters had nevertheless lined up vehicles on the sides of both the carriageways.

With Tuesday being a holiday for most, the situation was worse. Traffic police too admitted that the more visitors turned up in the area on Tuesday as compared to the day before. Traffic inspector Ravindra Vashishtha told TOI, “A total of 16 traffic police personnel were deployed around sectors 18 and 38. The deployment was routine. Lesser people turned up for celebrations on Monday.” As many as 936 challans were issued for traffic violations in special checking drives on Monday. On Tuesday, however, there was no special drive.