LAHORE: Oldest dry port of the Lahore city is not an easy access for importers, visitors and most importantly for vehicles used for supply of goods owing to deteriorated condition of road toward dry port.
Despite earning billions of rupees revenue from the Lahore Dry Port, over 200-metre long road leading to the main entrance of the port has been left unpaved, creating problems for movement of vehicles, for the last several years.
Despite the fact that a number of road projects are being launched in Lahore, no attention is paid to economically important road, increasing threats to heavy vehicles and their drivers.
The uneven stretches on road cause serious inconvenience for the visitors and also lead to many accidents. At least 40 to 50 containers of different sizes and loaded with different weights enter and leave the port daily.
An importer said that dry ports road covered with natural speed breakers were creating problems for the traders as sometime they imported some breakable items through this port.
“Rainy season is ahead and this road will get more digs and holes in coming moon soon which will create more issues for the drivers, besides damaging the costly vehicles,” he added.
No Government authority is serious for the rehabilitation of this road as they are busy in construction of metro tracks only, a driver said.
“Due to the dilapidated and bad condition of the road, the containers often meet with serious mishaps,” a customs agent said.
He said that “when rainy season starts the situation gets even worse as the ratio of containers’ accidents goes up but no one is there to address this grave problem.”
“Most of the times, goods and articles suffer major damages, causing millions of rupees loss to the importers,” he said.
An official of Pakistan Railways said that in railway territories no road will remain in bad condition. He said that the minister is paying personal attention to promote railway infrastructure and that all issues regarding roads in railway jurisdiction will be sought out very soon.
