Traveling on Grand Trunk Road all my life, it captured my imagination as a cultural curiosity when I read Rudyard Kipling’s Kim. At the beginning of the last century Kipling called it:
“a wonderful spectacle…. without crowding…. green-arched, shade-flecked … a river of life.â€
But Pakistan’s National Highway Number 5 (N5), alias the Grand Trunk Road, or simply the GT Road, presents a different impression now.
Commuting up and down the GT Road are caravans of trucks, buses, cars, animals and animal transport also auto-rickshaws, all having equal right of the way. On the GT Road every bus, truck, and a car must pass the vehicle ahead. “The GT Road,†a veteran traveler John Otto wrote says, “really belongs to the trucker.†And he is right in a way. Have you traveled there lately? Seen any changes?
Photo Credits: WesternRaider
Rumi saheb. yes I remember the ‘tayyara’ buses of pre-AC pre- Daewoo days :) I also remember the red color buses of GTS. The GTS buses that plied on Lahore-Peshawar GT Road route were of blue color and they also came fitted with a sleeping berth towards the front :)
I remember traveling on GT road in my childhood and later. Ahh..what pleasant memories. Those were the pre-AC-bus days when Tayyara busses ruled the GT road. Buses, Trucks and Trees.. and that Full moon peeping from the window.. what a nostalgia.
I traveled on the GT road a few months ago, the section between Mureedke and Kamonke was really in shambles. Roadworks were on for miles…
adeel.
N5 is from Karachi to Landi Kotal.
Between Lahore and Peshawar, N5 and GT Road are the same roads. The historical GT road’s Lahore-Peshawar portion became part of N5 when NHA gave number markers to Pakistani highways.
Correct me if I’m wrong, GT road goes (Kabul-)Peshawar-Rawalpindi-Gujaranwala-Lahore-Del hi.
N5 is interchangeable with GT road between RawalPindi and Lahore, reaching which, it forks and continues further south Okara-Multan-Bahawalpur-Sukkur-Hyderabad-Karachi.