Amer Mohammed Al Humaidi, Head of Planning and Projects at the Ministry of Municipality and Urban Planning.Pic : Salim Matramkot
BY RAYNALD C RIVERA and MOHAMMED OSMAN
DOHA: Large-scale upgrades to Qatar’s road network coupled with a lack of road signs is making it difficult for people to navigate and locate places.
Most people, especially those new to Qatar, say they find locating places a big challenge, blaming it on inadequate street signs which are, in many cases, not suitably placed.
“Streets, especially internal roads, are not properly labelled and the signs are not strategically placed,” said a lady motorist from the Philippines, adding, “Because of this, people rely on landmarks to find their way to certain places.”
“People here are not used to street names. I myself find it convenient to find the place by asking for landmarks close by than the street name,” she said.
Mushtaq Ahmed, a safety officer working here for five years, was of the same view, saying: “Here the landmarks are buildings; sometimes we have to look for a landmark to reach a particular building. Here there is no practice of identifying places with street names because people are not aware of the names.”
“I’ve been here for five years now but not yet aware of correct boundaries for any place. Actually there are no boundary signs,” he added.
A Western expatriate, Eliza Albinson, who has been in Doha for two years now, could not agree more, saying she had no idea where places began and ended.
“There is no mention of the name of the place on signboards of shops or buildings. If you have to locate a place it would be through buildings, roundabouts or traffic signals. Because of the new road developments, many such landmarks have been removed. Recently I got misled a few times in the West Bay and Lusail areas,” she said.
Even those who rely on public transport find it hard to get to their destination as the drivers encounter the same problem, especially the newly hired ones working with the two new taxi operators.
Taxi drivers first ask the passengers where they want to go and if they don’t know the route they don’t ferry them.
“There have been many instances when I could not take a passenger because I did not know the location, so I lose many customers because of that,” said a Bangladeshi driver working here for less than a month.
He said it was very easy for him to locate places in Dubai, where he worked as a taxi driver for three years, because of clear street signs in that city.
“I cannot move around the city with the navigation app that I have in my iPhone,” said an Arab expatriate, adding that even with the app he found it difficult to drive around because of the complexity of the road network and ongoing roadworks.
“Roundabouts are being changed to signals. Some roads are being closed temporarily because of repairs. These changes are not shown in the maps as it takes time to update them.”
Announcement of diversions caused by roadworks is made in the newspapers but road signs are placed only later, he said.
“Qatar should implement proper signage to identify locations,” suggests Romi Sebastian, an architect.
City planners, he said, should first install name signs on streets and junctions.
“This is the difference between Dubai and Doha; there (Dubai) a common man can easily find any place. Since the population is increasing in Doha it’s very essential to have proper signage to locate places,” said Sebastian.
“Now Qatar is introducing the numbering system, this is a good move. But this would help the ambulance service, fast food delivery, among others; not much helpful for the common man,” he added.
Shamila Ramanan, a housewife, said, “The new numbering system can help certain services reach a place, but it won’t help if we are directing a visitor home, it’s not possible for people to remember all building, street and zone numbers.”
Called Qatar Area Referencing System (QARS), the numbering project of the Centre for Geographic Information System (CGIS) is now at an advanced stage, with more than 90,000 new house number plates installed across the country.
Qatar is divided into seven municipalities and 98 zones. The number plates represent an address which includes the number of the zone, street and building.
Amer Mohammed Al Humaidi, Head of Planning and Projects at the Ministry of Municipality and Urban Planning, said QARS was a unique project in the Middle East.
“When we started this system, we faced strong objections and some recommendations, saying why don’t you use names instead of numbers? The problem with names is that one name can be repeated many times in different areas but numbers cannot be repeated because they are sequential,” Al Humaidi told The Peninsula.
He stressed the importance of increasing awareness of the benefit of using these numbers, including for services such as getting water and electricity connections, telecommunications, emergency services, and home delivery.
CGIS has also developed a bilingual app called Al Murshid, which guides users through geospatial services and displays a satellite map of the country. It locates addresses with the help of QARS address data, landmarks and geographical names, tracks the user’s location and gives information about distances between landmarks.
Although numbers are being used, street names would still be written on signs because they reflect a vital aspect of people’s history and heritage, Al Humaidi said.
With regard to how the names were chosen, he said, “Names are being chosen and approved by a special committee formed by the Minister of Municipality. It is headed by Sheikh Faleh bin Nasser bin Jassim Al Thani, assistant undersecretary for technical affairs at the ministry.”
A total of 3,890 old names of various areas in Qatar have been collected since the late 90’s in collaboration with community leaders and elders. The names include those of villages and areas, some of which have disappeared after people moved to the city. With the expansion of the city and construction of new buildings some of the old names are now being used again, he said.
He said places were named after historical events and famous national figures as well as figures who represent the Arab-Islamic culture and civilization.
“That’s why you find a street called Omar Al Mukhtar, one of the historical Libyan figures who led the revolution against the Italians in 1911.”
Until last April, the Minister of Municipality had approved names of 2,796 streets in eight areas, out of 6,140 streets in 21 areas. Street names go through a number of processes, including consultation with government bodies, the local community and the Central Municipal Council, for comments and observations before they are approved by the minister.
The QARS project is being implemented in two phases; the first phase included placing a number plate on each building mentioning the zone, street and building numbers. It covered 98,000 buildings.
“Phase two is numbering the internal parts of a building such as flats, offices or shops. We have already started in Al Daayen Municipality,” he said.
This project, Al Humaidi said, would continue because it was related to construction and infrastructure projects all over the country.
“When the project was introduced, people hesitated, thinking it was difficult, but with strong support from the government we managed to implement it successfully.”
The ministry has proposed that the health sector use the system for registering patients at health centres.
“Through this, they will immediately know whether the patient is living in the area. They will also be able to know the number of people with chronic diseases in the area and how many doctors they need, as well as the population of the area... whether the health centre can accommodate the number or transfer some patients to other health centres.”
When the second phase of the project is finished, the postal service is likely to use the system instead of the post box number. Each flat will have a post box, making postal delivery accurate and easier. The postal authorities are now studying this, according to Al Humaidi.
In addition, the system will be used in official documents such as commercial registrations, licences and contracts.
“The government spent QR12m converting all maps from paper to digital. This is because the government realised the importance of this in the near future. And this is the time to use this.”
“We are continuously updating the database and the maps. The satellite map of Qatar was last updated in June. We are going to invite tenders to have another company which can provide us with a satellite map.”
When it comes to ministries, they can give licenses using the GIS system to be fair in geographical distribution.
Following the Traffic Department’s move to modify car number plates by replacing Arabic numerals with English ones, the current building plates will also be changed.
“We can’t prevent people using popular landmarks to identify places, but with the gradual use of this system people will become more familiar with it, making it easy for them. Our role is to introduce them to this new system so that they use it in their official documents.”
THE PENINSULA
