Traffic snarls on roads leading to BJP rally venue

Even though over 1.50 lakh people attended the BJP’s MahaRally in the city on Friday, traffic movement, according to authorities, was smoother in comparison to Thursday, which saw some worst traffic snarls. The railways, however, had to cancel trains in order to ferry attendees in and out of the city. Both Central and Western Railways plied 50 special trains to ferry BJP workers to Mumbai. Due to this, six trains were cancelled and 49 were delayed on the Western Railway.

On Friday morning, due to various traffic diversions, regular office goers in BKC faced slight delays in reaching work. However, most of them, hearing about the event earlier, had decided to leave their vehicles home and take public transport and cabs instead. “I took an Uber to work, so that even if I am stuck in jam, I won’t have my car,” said Shantanu Malik, who commutes to his office in BKC from Bandra. Several others took to social media to complain about traffic snarls, which were immediately responded to by the traffic authorities.

According to Amitesh Kumar, joint commissioner of traffic, “Today’s traffic was very peaceful. It was as good as any other Friday. We had put up diversions and people also cooperated.”

There were congestions on important roads leading towards BKC due to the number of people reaching the spot at MMRDA grounds. Airlines, including Vistara and Jet Airways, had issued advisory to passengers to allow more time for their journey to the airport due to congestion on the Western and Eastern Highways towards BKC. “It was tough to reach Kandivali from Mumbai airport after I landed on Friday morning… I almost took two hours to reach home from the airport,” Kala Rajendran, who was travelling from Chennai said.