Thousands of vehicles were stuck on Ho Chi Minh City – Long Thanh – Dau Giay Expressway at the intersection of the newly-opened Dau Giay – Phan Thiet Expressway.
A ceremony was held at 8 a.m. Saturday to put the Dau Giay – Phan Thiet Expressway into service.
Many drivers were not aware of the event and arrived much earlier, but then had to wait in line for the road to officially open.
A traffic jam at 10 a.m. on the HCMC – Long Thanh – Dau Giay Expressway, which runs from HCMC to Dong Nai Province.
With the opening of Dau Giay – Phan Thiet Expressway, which stretches 99 km through Dong Nai and Binh Thuan provinces, it will now theoretically take around two hours to travel by car without traffic from HCMC to Binh Thuan’s Phan Thiet, which is known for its beaches and sand dunes. The trip previously took five hours before the new expressway.
“I thought it would be faster ] using the expressway, but I had to wait in gridlock for over 30 minutes,” said a driver named Chien, who on his way from Dong Nai to Phan Thiet for vacation.
A rest stop around 1km from the intersection filled with vehicles as people decided to take a break instead of waiting in line on the road at a dead stop.
“I’ve waited here since 7 a.m. I’m on my way back home to Binh Thuan,” said Tu, who currently works at a bank in HCMC.
Vietnamese people are granted five days off beginning Saturday for the Hung King's Death Commemoration Day on April 29, Reunification Day on April 30 and Labor Day on May 1, and then two more days’ compensation because the holidays fall on a weekend.
Ha and his family waited beside the road, trying to make the best of things.
Ha’s hometown is in Binh Thuan Province and for him, “the new expressway will make it much more convenient for people in the south-central region.”
The traffic jam got even worse when three cars collided on the HCMC – Long Thanh – Dau Giay Expressway at around 10 a.m.
It took police more than one hour to calm the chaos following the accident and get traffic flowing again.
Lines of cars about to enter the HCMC – Long Thanh – Dau Giay Expressway in Thu Duc City.
According to traffic police, the HCMC – Long Thanh – Dau Giay Expressway, which also leads to Ba Ria – Vung Tau Province (home to the beach town of Vung Tau), received more than 100,000 vehicles on Saturday morning, which is four times higher than normal days.
The thick congestion on the expressway caused a number of drivers tried to switch to what they thought would be the road less travelled by crossing the Dong Nai River using the ferries at Cat Lai Port.
However, the situation there was not any better there as lines for the ferries also backed up in another seemingly endless line, as seen in the photo above.
