By Michel Cousins.
Tripoli, 17 January 2013:
Tripoli local council and Congress members from the capital met today at the Congress offices to . . .[restrict]look into the growing traffic crisis in the city. Officials from Tripoli’s Traffic Directorate and the Ministry of Planning were also at the meeting.
The aim is to come up with concrete plans to tackle congestion.
Traffic jams are now widely reagrded as one of the biggest problems for Tripoli residents. A cross-town journey that should take 20 minutes can take an hour and a half, even longer.
Traffic violations are seen as largely to blame, notably illegal parking, market stalls on the carriageway, driving down one-way streets the wrong way and jumping traffic lights. Illegal parking, with roads reduced to just one lane because of double and even triple parking, is viewed as the major contributor to the chaos.
The number of vehicles on the capital’s streets has also rocketed since the revolution. Many are said to have been imported illegally.
The meeting also looked into unauthorised random construction work being carried out since the 17 February Revolution.
A large number of buildings have been demolished without permission in the past year and in their place new structures are going up that are many storeys higher, again without planning approval. In several cases, they are also expanding to take in the public sidewalks. [/restrict]
