Re: A ride on the PML-N’s shiny new toy
Back in the 80s, Islamabad was a lush green city (even as a kindergartner I remember how beautiful the ride to our school was), but in the last two decades the greenery thinned out quite a bit due to development. I was very appalled but later realized that this is not the Islamabad of the 80s which used to go dead at 9pm and the expansion of roads etc was becoming a fast necessity especially with the amount of cars on the roads. It was the sad bitter truth. Although most of us who lived in Islamabad here were probably lucky enough to be riding on our own cars to school, work etc. must have at one point ridden the public transport in the twin cities. It was filthy, cramped, not exactly cheap and dangerous! They would practically stuff these wagons and at the stops it was a scary sight seeing them compete with other wagons to offload/load more passengers by making sharp turns, sudden stops etc. The ones that were not affluent enough to afford vehicles or taxis had to rely on this on a daily basis. The Varan bus system was a good solution but they were using the same roads as other traffic so they were subjected to the same amount of delays and problems. To me, this transportation system was a necessity in the twin cities. We need such a system in every metro city in the country.