Chennai: The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) is gearing up to float a tender for commencing the long-pending 262-km of Chennai-Bengaluru Green Expressway.
Officials said that even as they suffered a lot in acquiring lands earlier, they completed 95 per cent of land acquisition. The works are supposed to have started last March.
In order to cut the travel time from Chennai to Bengaluru by at least three hours, the Union Surface Ministry proposed this six-lane project in 2011 and in this expressway, vehicles can go up to 120 kmph. Further, such stretch will be parallel to the existing 365-km road. Since then, NHAI officials started acquiring land of around 3,000 hectares from places falling under both Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.
“Even though such a big project was sanctioned seven years ago, acquiring land was a daunting task for us. Further, we needed to get certificates from Environment and Public Works Department, as the stretch will pass through many water bodies,” said an engineer, NHAI, seeking anonymity. The volume of vehicles passing through the existing roads will reduce and this project will prevent heavy vehicles from entering the city, he added.
Meanwhile, urban development activists have demanded to start the long-pending works. S Mohanram, a civic activist and president of consumer protection council urged the official to proceed with work on the Chennai-Bengaluru Expressway. “At a time when the number of vehicles is on the rise, focus should be turned on the road infrastructure. If the officials keep delaying, the cost of project will also be increasing,” he pointed out.
When his comment was sought, G Athipathi, Project Director, NHAI, Chennai, admitted that there were hurdles in the beginning during land acquisition.
“However, we have almost acquired necessary lands and enough compensation has also been provided to the land owners under Land Acquisition Act,” he said, adding that they would soon call for tendering process.
