Traffic on Lagos roads has improved tremendously following the completion and opening of the Lagos Island-bound lane of the Third Mainland Bridge to motorists.
This is even as the gridlock has shifted to the outbound lane of the bridge as many motorists leaving the Island for the Mainland at the close of work spend hours on the road before getting home.
The Lagos Island bound lane of the Third Mainland Bridge was opened to traffic two weekends ago after seven weeks of comprehensive repair on the road, leaving serious pains on road users, who suffered hours of traffic congestion on Lagos roads while trying to go for their businesses in the last seven ways.
The seven-week closure of the bridge pushed traffic to all the alternative routes on the mainland especially the Eko Bridge-Apogbon-CMS and Ikorodu Road-Jibowu-Yaba-Oyingbo-Iddo-Carter Bridge-CMS.
BusinessDay visit to the bridge last week revealed that motorists heading to the Island from the Mainland are now having a smooth ride on the newly delivered road as it now takes an average of 10 to 15 minutes to move from Iyana Oworonshoki to Adeniji Adele axis of the road.
This was a huge improvement compared to the horrible experience commuters faced in the past seven weeks when the outbound lane from Lagos Island to the Mainland was in use.
Then, diverting traffic to the outbound from the Iyana Oworonshoki for motorists going to the Island and back to the inbound lane at the Adeniji Adele axis resulted in huge traffic congestion that used to take over 1 hour 30 minutes daily.
Also, it was noticed that construction has commenced on the outbound lane of the bridge, leaving the traffic authorities to continue to manage traffic timing on the completed inbound lane of Lagos Island Lane.
“I was happy to see that the completed Lagos Island bound lane of the Third Mainland Bridge has been opened to motorists for use. I did not spend up to 30 minutes to get to my office in Victoria Island on Monday morning, which was usually traffic heavy in the past seven weeks,” said Ayomide Akomolafe, a Lagos-based HR practitioner.
Akomolafe, who lives in the Egbeda area of Lagos, said she used to leave home by 6: am every morning to be able to meet up with the 9: am office resumption time and that she was practically spending three hours on the road before getting to the office.
According to her, she was able to get to the office 1 hour earlier than usual on Monday due to the improved traffic on the Third Mainland Bridge.
Sunday Olalekan, an engineer, said he used the bridge at the weekend and was happy that it was a smooth ride all the way.
Olalekan said that it didn’t take him up to 15 minutes to get to Adeniji Adele on Saturday and that the good thing for him was that the commercial bus he boarded at the 7/8 area of Lagos reduced the transportation fare from N1,000 down to N800.
Also, Margret Uchechukwu, a Lagos-based businesswoman, expressed relief that the opening of the completed lane of the bridge has helped her significantly.
Uchechukwu said she moves from Oshodi to Obalende every day and it has not been easy in the last seven weeks the inbound lane of the bridge was closed to traffic.
The shift in traffic gridlock to the outbound lane of the bridge left Joseph Oti, a staff of one of the companies in Victoria Island, worried last Wednesday after spending over 4 hours on the road before getting home.
He said that going home has become a nightmare due to the congestion on the bridge especially in the evening hours.
According to the Federal Ministry of Works, the Third Mainland Bridge was closed to traffic at 11 am on Tuesday, January 9, 2024.
With the closure, the bridge usually opens between 12 am and 12 noon for Mainland inbound Island passengers while those coming from the Island to the Mainland were taking Eko Bridge from noon to midnight, motorists will be able to access the bridge from the Island to the Mainland while motorists from the mainland heading towards the Island will have to use Eko Bridge.
BusinessDay reports that the Federal Government announced a traffic diversion on the Third Mainland Bridge beginning on Thursday, February 22, 2024, from the Iyana Oworonshoki to the Lagos Island carriageway of the Bridge.
The government explained that the diversion was to enable the contractor to continue the comprehensive repairs on the Oworonsoki bound lane of the bridge.
