Visakhapatnam: Traffic jams on National Highway passing through the city would shortly be relieved since the state government is considering to enliven the proposal for upgrading the Anandapuram-Anakapalli state highway.
The state government directed officials of urban authority to go for detailed project report on the proposal. Keeping in view the city traffic that has been shooting up every year, officials earlier proposed to convert Anandapuram-Anakapalli state highway into a four-lane or six-lane project which has been hanging fire for past four years.
The road and buildings department placed a proposal for an alternative way of converting the Anandapuram–Anakapalli state highway into a four-lane road that would serve as bypass for city part of the NH-5 from Anakapalli to Anandapuram and failed to take off as it involved huge investment in acquisition of land and project implementation costs.
National Highways Authority also proposed to convert the portion of NH in the city limits into a six-lane road and it also did not materialise. Subsequently, the AP Road Development Corporation (APRDC) also proposed to take up a four-lane highway under PPP mode and it is under pipeline. The project cost estimated was '455 crore for upgrading the road from Anakapalli to Anandapuram via Sabbavaram for a stretch of 48 km.
“Detailed project report for Vizag Metro Rail Project is going to prepared shortly. On the basis of the recommendations, we consider to make proposals for the upgradation. State highways wing has surveyed earlier but the DPR has still to be prepared. We have been requesting the state government for sometime to handover the city portion of national highway to the GVMC for maintenance,” said B. Jayaram Reddy, chief engineer of the GVMC.
If the government hands over city portion of the NH to the GVMC, Anandapuram-Anakapalli state highway would be given away to National Highways to develop according to the current needs.
Further, the Visakhapatnam Port Trust has also proposed to partner with the state government and the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) in taking up the six-laning of the highway from Anakapalle to Anandapuram in a joint venture.
