Rain of tourists in city adds to traffic pile up

Palace saw 23,186 visitors, Zoo 20,293 on Saturday; Parliamentary Panel on Agriculture, Animal Husbandry and Food Processing among VIP visitors

Mysuru: The weekend holidays has contributed to the surge in tourist footfalls in Mysuru, popular as Cultural Capital of the State, with travellers caring a damn for the intermittent rainfall. With Palace being the main tourist attraction, there was a increase in vehicle density, affecting the smooth traffic flow in the heart of the city.

Yesterday being the fourth Saturday of the month, when Government employees and bank employees have a closed holiday, there was a spurt in the number of tourists visiting Palace and the tourist attractions in the surroundings like Fun Fair Exhibition at Dasara Exhibition Grounds, located beside the Palace, Sri Chamarajendra Zoological Gardens (Mysuru Zoo) to name a few.

Along with regular traffic, the tourist vehicles that came in hordes, turned the stretch of roads in Palace surroundings into a busy one, keeping the Police on tenterhooks from the morning hours, who found it tough to regulate traffic. By afternoon, the situation worsened with further increase in traffic density, keeping the Traffic Police busy.

The prominent Circles in the surroundings of  Palace, like K.R. Circle, Albert Victor Road, Chamaraja Wadiyar Circle, Jayachamaraja Wadiyar Circle (Hardinge Circle), Bengaluru-Nilgiri Road, Sayyaji Rao Road and Rajendra Circle (near Gun House), saw bumper-to-bumper traffic.

Following heavy traffic, the two-wheeler riders were looking for short cuts in cross roads, that added to the traffic near Dodda Gadiyara Circle, Ashoka Road, Vani Vilas Road, Mahatma Gandhi Road, Chamaraja Double Road, RTO West Circle, N. Madhava Rao Circle (Agrahara Circle), Maharana Pratap Simhaji Circle and other roads. The situation was the same till evening, which continued today too.

In Palace alone yesterday (May 24), total 23,186 visitors were recorded and on Friday, there were 15,168 visitors. It included 12,258 adults, 2,856 children and 54 foreigners.

At Zoo, there were 20,293 visitors yesterday, 13,481 visitors on Friday.

Karanji Lake, that also falls under Zoo Authority of Karnataka (ZAK), witnessed 1,630 visitors on Saturday and 1,099 on Friday.

Parliamentary Standing Committee

Amid this, a 31-member delegation of Parliamentary Standing Committee on Agriculture, Animal Husbandry and Food Processing from New Delhi, visited the Palace yesterday.

T.S. Subramanya, Deputy Director of Mysore Palace Board, said: “The Parliamentary Committee was led by its Chairman and MP Charanjit Singh Channi (former Punjab Chief Minister). A Justice also visited the Palace same day. Following VIP visits, there was a heavy movement of convoy vehicles too, along with the regular tourist vehicles.”