‘Stinking bottleneck’ to smooth gateway: Facelift of Delhi’s arterial stretch Dhaula Kuan begins

As reported by The Indian Express last week, new bus lanes will be created and existing ones expanded to streamline the movement of buses as part of the project.

“Initiated expansion & rationalization of lanes for Interstate and DTC Buses & construction of toilets on land given by DDA… we’d soon have a smoothened gateway to the national capital, benefiting lakhs of travellers & millions of Delhites from South West, West & South Delhi” L-G Saxena posted on X.

“Dhaula Kuan is one of the most significant portals of contemporary Delhi. Ever since it rejuvenated through the Flyover complex, inaugurated first in 2003, it has been rendered into a terrible stinking bottleneck due to neglect,” he said in another post.

Among the busiest transit points in Delhi, leading to and from the airport and further towards Gurgaon and Jaipur on the one hand and towards south Delhi and Northwest Delhi’s Naraina on the other, the location sees an estimated daily footfall of over five lakh vehicles.

According to government sources, the biggest reason for the characteristic traffic jams at the location was found to be unregulated and ill-managed bus movement. Multiple government agencies want to confront this menace well in time before the onset of Dussehra, which signals the beginning of the festive season and triggers an upswing in the number of commuters in the area.

The Metro station at Dhaula Kuan is a major interchange point for two lines, but according to government officials, it is found to be a point of persistent congestion mainly due to Delhi’s own as well as interstate buses.

“A key reason is that Rajasthan-bound buses tend to stop here to pick passengers, apart from city buses,” a senior government official said, adding that while interstate buses from Rajasthan are supposed to allow passengers to alight at Bikaner House, Dhaula Kuan is preferred by the latter given better connectivity to the metro as well as buses operated by the Delhi government.

“The current arrangement does not have proper bus lanes even though three bus queue shelters are installed on the slip road,” the official said.

“The L-G had given instructions to create a framework for seamless bus movement allowing hassle-free passenger pick-ups by creating additional lanes, widening existing lanes and putting proper markings for bus bays and bus lanes in place,” the official added.

In addition to travelling through the route to the airport and back hours after he had taken over as L-G, Saxena has visited the spot several times over the last year; two of these visits were this month and the last one on Sunday.

The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), teams of Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi, the Public Works Department (PWD), and the Transport Department are part of the area’s facelift.

The project involves putting in place two dedicated bus lanes for interstate buses and bus box markings, widening two dedicated bus lanes for city buses in the front, and creating another bus lane after removing encroachment.

Bus queue shelters, bollards to guide bus movement and lighting along metro pillars to ensure the safety of passengers at night are also part of the plan.