Bhaktapur, July 30

The 10-kilometre Bhaktapur-Banepa road stretch along the Araniko Highway do not have any pavement for pedestrians to walk on. As a result, pedestrians can be seen walking on the road risking their lives.

“What makes it even more difficult is that vehicles travel very fast on this stretch,” said Inspector Mitra Bandhu Sharma of Metropolitan Police range Jagati- Bhaktapur. Most of the pedestrians are locals traveling through the road.

Adarsha, Jagati, Bhatedhukur, Basbhari, Nakhel, Sangha, Bhaisepati, and other places badly need pavements. Inspector Sharma said lack of pavement and high speed driving in these areas have increased chances of accidents.

Many people are compelled to travel through a longer, different road.

A local of Bhaktapur Krishna Shwori Potamaha said she has to travel daily from her home to Suryabinayak for work, and she preferred using the longer, but safer way. She said, “It is worse for women and girls, because many drivers drive carelessly with the intention to eve-tease women and bring their vehicles dangerously close to us.”

In 2011, a six-lane road with pavements nearly six miles long was built from Tinkune to Suryabinayak with the assistance of the Japanese government.

However, neither the road division of road nor the concerned municipalities have done anything about lack of pavements along the aforementioned stretch.

Dhurba Krishna Shrestha, senior engineer at Division Road Office, Katunje, said that because the Japanese government has informally extended its help in expanding the Suryabinayak to Dhulikhel road from January 2017, they cannot build the pavement.

“The two lane road will be expanded into six lanes. Constructing a pavement now is pointless as it would have to be destroyed for this project,” said Shrestha.