Here is Karachi’s “model” thoroughfare, Shahrah-e-Faisal (SEF). 15 kms from Metropole to the Airport, it falls under 2 Cantonments & 2 Districts. Before 2004, it had 3 bridges. Now it has 12. That hasn’t changed its capacity & it continues to be a nightmare. Here’s why. 
Nine flyovers & underpasses, costing billions, have been added over the last two decades to make this “signal-free,” & a thoroughfare for cars to speed through. Significant chunks were widened. What the planners ignored was that most parts of SEF are destinations.
In Districts East, Malir & Karachi Cantt, SEF passes through densely populated areas. This means one thing: lots of cuts for cars & bikes from these areas to access the road. The red dots on the map. Over 200 along the entire 30km stretch. As Faisal Cantt builds up, this will ⬆️.
So sure, you can speed up & down at 2am, or in off-traffic hour, but once the rush hour kicks in every morning & evening, the bridges & underpasses all just become funnels for the bumper-to-bumper traffic. More cuts means more disruption, which makes congestion worse.
There’s no escaping the truth. SEF will never be a thoroughfare. It is just a badly designed road with a shameful capacity of 500k cars. It needs to be redesigned, from the ground up, to be a transit-way, so it’s carrying capacity can be increased several folds.
I’ll write in more details about specifics later, but the purpose of sharing this now is to show @LHRDevAuthority the mistake they are making with Mall Rd. No amount of underpasses will turn Mall into a thoroughfare for cars. You have SEF’s example. Stop the madness.
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