It may sound strange to say that if one were to go on holiday, they'll come back to find that everything has changed. However, people who say things like this have never lived in Doha.
Last week or so I saw an advertisement in the newspaper for a major construction project that was going to take place in West Bay, which would require a significant change in traffic patterns. Now, before people think that this, too, is unusual news-- remember, this is Doha. *Not* seeing construction when going anywhere would be the unusual occurrence.
For weeks now, I had seen the people preparing diligently for the construction by building temporary roadways, gathering stylish orange and white barriers, moving the ever-present taxi queue off the street and into the City Centre underground, putting up huge No Parking signs, and so forth. However, I figured it would be at least a year before anything got done, and wasn't going to hold my breath in anticipation. Remember, this is Doha.
But then I got in my car Thursday morning, and encountered a completely new traffic scheme which had been constructed as I slept:
There is only one lane, and traffic that wants to go to City Centre has to use either this turnaround or the back road (which at least they opened back up, so there would be more than one way to the carpark). Obviously if a lot of cars go in through the front, it will mean that no one can pull onto the road from the slip road near my house. Fortunately, though, they have opened the "back road" going toward Rainbow Roundabout. It has been "open" for a bit, but driving the road required wrong-way-down-the-street navigation, twice, plus a slalom-like turn around the barriers blocking the road. Now, though, you can go down the street without the slalom-like navigation. Wrong-way driving is left to be determined.
On Thursday afternoon, thinking that the street seemed pretty empty, I looked out my window to discover that the roundabout has now been completely by-passed, so traffic cannot turn left to go toward Oryx Roundabout, nor can traffic turn right to go to City Centre:
We have been saying we should write a version of Grand Theft Auto specifically for Doha.
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