RAMALLAH, West Bank — The bus station is crowded with people leaving Ramallah for their hometowns in the West Bank provinces, especially on weekends and holidays. People can wait hours for their turn to ride the vehicles.

The overcrowding in Ramallah is not limited to the station. The city is like a beehive, virtually day and night on weekdays. The West Bank’s streets are filled with vehicles, and the sidewalks, which barely accommodate two people walking next to each other, are packed with pedestrians.

According to Salem Zawada, head of the master's program in the Urban Planning Department at Birzeit University, the overcrowding is caused by the large influx of employees and job seekers since the Palestinian Authority (PA) assumed responsibility for the city in 1995 and Ramallah became its de facto administrative center. 

“With the establishment of the PA, the construction was haphazard, and the investors were left without any supervision and without taking into account the city’s situation and infrastructure," Zawada told Al-Monitor. Another contributing factor, he said, was widely available credit, which allowed workers to buy apartments and cars.