Why Can’t Pune Traffic Police & Wardens Ease Congestion On University Road? Hear It From The Horse’s Mouth

Due to the delays in completion of the double-decker bridge from Esquare Junction to Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU) Square, commuters on the road are facing traffic congestion. This 2 km project forms part of Puneri Metro, a critical link for seamless connectivity to Hinjawadi, Aundh, Baner and Pashan from Shivajinagar. The two major bottlenecks on the road — University Square and Bank of Maharashtra Chowk at Shivajinagar — are areas of major traffic congestion.

Traffic on the road is managed by the traffic police and traffic wardens employed by Tata Siemens via contracting parties. After the completion of the road widening project from Pune University Chowk to the Reserve Bank of India, the second phase of road widening has commenced — RBI to Sancheti Hospital — with approvals for land acquisition involving 28 properties pending at a few locations.

The commuters navigating the road are concerned about delays in the completion of the project, as it aggravates their daily struggle. “The road remains heavily crowded during peak hours, especially when commuters travel to the office and back home in the morning and evening,” says Umesh Kale, traffic warden at SPPU Square.

“It takes me a minimum of 30 to 45 minutes to cover just a stretch of 2 kilometres from University Square to Shivaji Nagar Square,” said Priyanka Tayade, an IT employee commuting from Baner to Shivajinagar. Another commuter expressed concerns over the completion of the project. The under-construction project has overshot the completion deadline multiple times. “Now they are saying it will be fully operational by next year. It remains to be seen if it further gets delayed,” the commuter said.

The torrential rains add to the problem of commuters, as water starts flowing on the road from the upper side of University Square and collects below near Abil House. There exists no stormwater line on the side of the road for rainwater, and water flows over the road. The metro officials have been coordinating with the traffic officials to help ease traffic movement on the road.

A traffic official at the site told The Free Press Journal, “Metro personnel ask us to close the road on which work is going on. For instance, the Aundh-side road is expected to open for the public soon, so we close the road during low-traffic periods, for instance, in the afternoon. However, during peak hours, we have to open the road to ease traffic congestion.”

A Tata official working at the site, requesting anonymity, told FPJ that due to the continuous movement of vehicles on the road, it becomes really difficult to carry out work at full speed, as the fear of any mishap or accident always persists. This constitutes the major reason behind the delay of the ambitious project.

At University Square, the concern of sufficient manpower to manage the movement of vehicles needs evaluation, as the road sees heavy vehicle movement. There are two traffic police officials at the site, supplemented by four to five traffic wardens to ease vehicle movement. “Earlier, there used to be 15–20 traffic wardens at the site. Now we have only four. Metro has shifted them to other sites as most of the work at this site has been completed,” a traffic policeman said.

Pune Traffic Police have implemented multiple diversions on the road to ease the burden. For instance, a circular one-way road from University Square to Pashan Road and Baner Chowk, alongside no-signal lanes for traffic from Baner and Aundh toward Shivajinagar. Though these measures have been effective, they have emerged as choke points on the road because the road width gets reduced and vehicles clog the junction.

A traffic official requesting anonymity says, “The Metro construction limits our capacity to fully resolve traffic congestion until the flyover becomes operational.” The queries related to real traffic monitoring, the effectiveness of the diversions, and additional measures to improve traffic management remain unanswered, as the main traffic police personnel at University Square refrained from commenting on the issue.

As the commuters await the flyover’s completion, the road from Pune University Chowk to Sancheti Hospital has emerged as a test of patience — with the promise of smoother roads still months away.