• DIG says speed limits for different roads to be set after completion of road safety, engineering audit
• Police say prior to launch of e-challan system, citywide speed limit for cars, motorcycles, etc was 30km/h
• In first phase, 60km/h limit set for cars, bikes and LTVs on Sharea Faisal
• Many believe top speed on city’s main artery is ‘ok for bikers but too slow for cars’

KARACHI: The newly introduced automated e-ticketing system appears to have been launched in haste as traffic authorities have issued hundreds of challans for speeding, but they are yet to set the speed limit for vehicles on major thoroughfares, it emerged on Tuesday.

Last week, authorities had installed speed limit signs on Sharea Faisal, despite the fact that the traffic police had already issued 1,967 tickets for speeding within the first week (from Oct 27 to Nov 3) of the launch of the Traffic Regulation and Citation System (Tracs).

The traffic police said they are in the process of fixing speed limits for vehicles on different arteries in the metropolis and in the first phase they set 60 kilometres per hour (km/h) on Sharea Faisal for all cars, motorbikes and light transport vehicles (LTVs) and 30 km/h for heavy transport vehicles (HTVs).

DIG Traffic Pir Mohammed Shah conceded that at present “road-specific speed limits” were not notified.

“A comprehensive road safety and engineering audit including assessment of road geometry, access points, pedestrian activity, and traffic flow is under way,” he told Dawn. “Once the audit is completed, revised and road-specific speed limits will be notified.”

He said that currently a uniform, but interim, speed limit is in place for all roads in the metropolis.

“At present, the citywide speed limit for HTVs is 60 km/h, while for cars, motorcycles and LTV it is 30 km/h,” he said. However, he did not know when this speed limit had been fixed or whether it had ever been revised.

Asked as to how fines were imposed over speeding violation, the DIG claims: “Limits were displayed from the day 1 through digital boards on all digital streamers across the city.”

DIG defends speed limit on signal-free Sharea Faisal

People using Sharea Faisal for their daily commute are expressing their surprise over the speed limit of 60 km/h, saying the road is almost signal free from Hotel Metropole traffic intersection to Karachi Airport.

Many people are of the view that the speed limit makes sense for motorcyclists, but for cars, 60 km/h is too slow on a signal-free road.

A senior official, requesting anonymity, told Dawn that Sharea Faisal is used for VVIP traffic and vehicles part of their motorcade drive at the minimum speed of 100 km/h.

“The speed limit should have been 80 km/h for LTVs and cars and 60 km/h for motorbikes,” he said.

However, the DIG Traffic told Dawn the speed limit was fixed keeping in view road safety, and not traffic flow alone.

He said although Sharea Faisal now functions as a signal-free corridor, “it remains a mixed-traffic urban artery, with multiple entry/exit points, pedestrian activity at certain locations, service lanes, and merging traffic from side roads”.

“Higher speed will significantly increase the likelihood and severity of accidents,” he said.

He believed that the 60 km/h limit was in line with “international standards for urban expressways where pedestrian and mixed-use interactions still exist”.

“Our goal is to maintain smooth traffic movement while prioritising the safety of commuters, motorcyclists and pedestrians,” DIG Shah said.

He said that the 30 km/h speed limit for heavy vehicles was due to their “size, braking distance and impact force”, which posed a significantly higher risk at high speeds.

“Even at night, Sharea Faisal continues to have private traffic, motorcyclists, and ride-hailing vehicles, and any high-speed accident involving a heavy vehicle can be catastrophic,” he said.

Published in Dawn, November 19th, 2025