Choked Kalyan bridges lead to chaos on roads

Saturday evening turned out to be a nightmare for commuters in Kalyan, with all four major bridges in the city witnessing heavy traffic jams that lasted for nearly

Saturday evening turned out to be a nightmare for commuters in Kalyan, with all four major bridges in the city witnessing heavy traffic jams that lasted for nearly three hours.

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Many took to social media, calling it the worst traffic jam the city has seen, as travelling on Waldhuni, Shahad, Patripool and Durgadi bridges turned into a nightmare. There were requests asking drivers not to take the bridges.

The Patripool bridge helps one connect between Kalyan-Dombivli and Navi Mumbai; the Durgadi bridge between Kalyan, Bhiwandi and Thane; and the Shahad bridge connects Kalyan to Murbad, Titwala, Malshej and Ahmednagar.

According to traffic police, a dumper truck broke down on the Waldhuni Bridge — which connects Ulhasnagar and Kalyan — at 3pm, owing to an empty fuel tank and added to commuters’ woes.

“The driver told us that there was no fuel in the vehicle, as the civic body did not pay the contractor on time. We had to wait for one-and-a-half hours for the truck to get refuelled. This is negligent on the civic body’s part. Many such dumpers and civic buses break down on the bridges during peak hours,” said Sukhdev Patil, senior traffic police inspector, Kalyan (West).

“The dumper broke down all of a sudden and the vehicles on the bridge stopped in a queue. It took 45 minutes for me to cross the bridge; it takes five minutes when there’s no traffic,” said Sandeep Mane, 39, a motorist.

The 21-km-long Kalyan-Shilphata road was completely jammed till late evening.

“If one bridge gets jammed, the others are also affected by it. Since it is Saturday evening, many people are out shopping for Ganeshotsav,”said Patil.

“I was taking my Ganesh idol from Shivaji Chowk to Tehsildar Office on the station road, and it took two almost two hours for me to reach my destination,” said Anand Patil, 40, a resident of Kalyan station road. “The problems multiplied with hawkers and vehicles parked haphazardly on the market road.”

At Bail Bazaar, APMC market and Netivli Chowk, vehicles lined up in a long gridlock all the way to Patripool bridge. Similar scenes were witnessed from Prem Auto Chowk to Shahad bridge.

Traffic police said 25 officers were deployed to manage the chaos.