70,000 Vehicles in 72 Hours: Shimla Is Running Out of Road

Shimla, a leisurely retreat for those fleeing the heat, is now a city gripped with traffic chaos and congestion due to the sheer volume of humanity running towards it. And the numbers tell a story that no traffic cone can contain.

In just 72 hours, roughly 70,000 vehicles poured into the Himachal Pradesh capital, according to officials who spoke to news agency PTI.

Zoom out to the last 24 days, and the figure swells to over 6,31,000 vehicles, with 3,70,000 of them arriving via the Chandigarh-Kalka corridor alone.

Significant streams of tourists have also made their way through Kinnaur, Bilaspur and Kullu, as families and friend groups from across northern and western India chase the cool air that Shimla, Darjeeling, Kashmir and similar high-altitude destinations promise every summer.

The trouble is, the peak has not even arrived yet. The tourist season in Himachal Pradesh typically crests in the first week of June.

This year, however, the calendar has been upended. Heatwave-like conditions scorching Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra and Delhi have pushed the exodus northward weeks earlier than usual, leaving Shimla's infrastructure gasping for breath before the real rush begins.

The Dhalli-Kufri stretch has emerged as a particular flashpoint, where illegal parking, roadside hawkers and makeshift eateries have whittled down already narrow roads to near-impassable corridors.

Morning and evening peak hours have become exercises in collective frustration, with residents and tourists alike spending long stretches marooned on roads that were never built for this scale of pressure.

The administration is not without a plan, even if its execution remains a work in progress. ASP Abhishek, speaking to PTI Videos, acknowledged the mounting strain while outlining the measures being deployed.

"In response to the ever-increasing vehicular pressure, special arrangements have been made across the city. Shimla has been divided into five zones and the responsibility to manage traffic has been entrusted to a gazetted officer in each," he said.

"Volunteers are also being enlisted to assist in managing traffic, while police are facilitating the use of alternative routes to ease congestion within the city," the officer added.

Vehicles bound for Upper Shimla are being diverted through the Shoghi-Mehli route to relieve pressure on the main roads.

Despite repeated complaints, locals allege that police have largely remained mute spectators as the chaos compounds with each passing day.

Additional police personnel are expected to be deployed once the ongoing panchayat elections wrap up on May 31, officials indicated. Whether that reinforcement will prove sufficient against what is anticipated to be an even heavier June surge remains the defining question of Shimla's summer.