Adie writes

There is no surprise that RTA is planning to enhance their money making source the Salik to other parts of the city. It’s surprising that they say they are going to extend Salik to almost all the other crossings and major roads. So, are they actually implementing the draconian Road tax in the garb of Salik. They might as well have a lump sum collected from any road user based on their value of the car. That atleast would be fair to people in line with their economic status and ability to pay.

First, off I agree with the respondents that there is no clear alternative, but if money is the prime motive then it’s not congestion that they should harp about, coz I would love to know their explanation of installing Salik on every crossing over the creek and every other major road. Possibly, the campaign would be ‘Stay on your side of the Creek’.

RTA policy maker’s would not be familiar with the weather, coz if this was so, they would need to find alternatives for people to use to these upcoming metro stations. Possibly an air conditioned Auto rickshaw could be used. There is the risk of added tricky traffic jams.

Taxi’s are no better alternative. You have less taxis, with enhanced problems of bad attitude, customer refusal and the RTA still goes ahead and makes Car pooling illegal. If the Taxis are public transportation then why are they charging Salik. Excluding them would encourage more Taxis being used by people. Clearly, the companies running these taxis are ensuring they take their share of Salik profits.

Either they are far too many cooks running RTA or they really need to clear their intention of how they visualise the city to run. If the planning of RTA were so great with managing Dubai traffic, then the 14th Jan closure of roads would not have been an alternative. That in itself was a perfect example of a failing transport system in Dubai.

I think ‘Salik’ is just the failed public face of RTA.