Thimphu (Kuensel/ANN) - Queue all vehicles that vroom the city roads and highways across the country from Thimphu eastward.
It will climb over several passes, bend through all zigs and undulating highways that are representative of Bhutanese roads and almost reach Bumthang about 267km from Thimphu.
The 26km that it is short of reaching will soon be covered in a few months time.
The 58,511vehicles in the country today include trailer trucks that covers perhaps a significant stretch on the road compared with other trucks, heavy excavators, cars and those as small as two wheelers.
Imagine a majority of these vehicles that almost stretch up to central Bhutan are concentrated in the capital city.
With almost 13 vehicles hitting the roads in Thimphu every day, observers fear that Thimphu will soon be locked with cars if something is not done soon. More than half of these are light vehicles.
Phuentsholing roads see about nine new vehicles daily.
Records with road safety and transport authority show that about 50 percent of the vehicles in Bhutan are in Thimphu, Phuentsholing, Gelephu and Samdrupjongkhar.
The 26.16 square km capital city today has 208.85km of road. As of July, Thimphu has 31,479 vehicles and about 100,000 people.
Which means there is a car for every three people today.
At the national level, its one car for every 13 persons, which transport officials say is one of the highest, in terms of car density, in the world.
"The government is concerned about the growth of vehicles in the country," information and communications minister Nandalal Rai said. "This is the biggest challenge we're facing in terms of transport and traffic."
The way Bhutan's motorisation age is speeding has alarmed transport officials and observers.
In the last five years, the number of motor vehicles has doubled in Bhutan.
At the nine per cent growth rate in vehicle numbers, Bhutan today sees about 10,000 new vehicles every year. As of July, there are 58,511 vehicles in the country.
"At this rate, we'd have about 100,000 vehicles in the next five years, if nothing is done about it," road safety and transport authority's director Tashi Norbu said.
In the last five years, the number of private cars has increased by a whooping 128 per cent, while taxis shot up by 95 per cent.
"There's a buying frenzy and people are just buying cars because it's easy to get loans," Tashi Norbu said. "But the road infrastructure in Thimphu and elsewhere is now unable to contain the current vehicle volume."
Banks said they have about three people applying for vehicle loan everyday at one of their branches across the country. There are however other loans, they said, that people avail to buy cars.
At this rate, the traffic scenario is expected to double by 2020, stated Bhutan Transport 2040 Integrated Strategic Vision.
"This implies that the currently most heavily trafficked road, Thimphu to Phuentsholing could be carrying in excess of 2,000 vehicles per day (vpd) by 2020," a report by Asian Development Bank states.
Unless improvements are made, with these traffic volumes, the existing roads will become increasingly congested, and speeds can be expected to decline to unacceptable levels.
According to records with the department of roads, there are almost 7,000km of roads snaking throughout the country.
What also worries policy makers is how high the risk of dying has become on Bhutanese roads.
About 66 lives were lost to road crashes annually in Bhutan for the last five years. Between 2005 until 2010, road crashes killed 319 people and injured 2,648 across the country.
Fatality rate last year was 15 deaths per 10,000 registered vehicles, making it one of the highest in the region. Developed countries have less than two to three deaths per 10,000 vehicles.
Each of the 67 automobile workshops in Thimphu today get at least two cars every day for repair and maintenance. At all times, each workshop has between 20-30 cars for repair.
The only measure to congestion problem, which transport officials say is "an unfortunate consequence of prosperity", is to have corrective measures in place.
Lyonpo Nandala Rai said public transport must be made reliable and efficient to minimise the use of private vehicles.
Other measures the authorities are considering are to have user-friendly traffic structures, such as roundabouts in every junction to avoid congestion, to inculcate good driving culture, and to increase the required qualification to obtain a driving license.
Information and communications secretary Dasho Kinley Dorji said the whole purpose of a transport system has to be understood first to have a systematic transport system in place.
He said the transport system including roads should be based on movement of people and goods.
"To control the number of vehicles, you have to know how many vehicles the roads can carry," he aid. "At some stage, you could introduce taxes for using road and bridges.
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