At around 5 p. m. , Samina Hassan Laghari leaves her office in Karachi. She waits about half an hour for a bus, spends another hour to 90 minutes traveling and then walks 15 minutes home. In a report published in Dawn in September 2026, Laghari describes the poorly lit roads, speeding traffic and safety concerns that make the last stretch of her journey difficult. Her experience captures an economic cost that rarely appears in official statistics: the time people lose simply trying to get home.



