Chennai: The Rs 1,530 crore Chennai Port to Mduravoyal four-lane elevated link road project will finally take off. As per the new alignment, it will cover a total length of 20.3 km and the revised draft detailed project report (DPR) for the project will be submitted by NHAI by October 10. The project cross section has been upgraded from 20 m to 29 m. Out of a total 7,400 m length area for clearance of slums in the project, 3,400 m has been cleared.
Indian Navy and Chennai Port Trust (CPT) have mutually agreed on the alignment, especially at the land point in the Port. CPT will provide 50 per cent of the total cost of '470 crore towards land acquisition and relief and rehabilitation while the remaining 50 per cent would be borne by the state government. Additional cost, if any, for acquiring land, relief and rehabilitation, would also be borne by the state.
The naval authorities have agreed to exchange land housing their existing residential quarters with CPT on provision of equal extent of land in order to enable the alignment of the elevated road pass through the existing Naval quarters near Napier Bridge.
The Shipping Ministry has also given in-principle approval to the proposal for alienation of CPT land to Naval Authorities in lieu of taking over the Navy land by Chennai Port.
Union Minister of State for Finance and Shipping Pon Radhakrishnan, who held discussions with the officials concerned on the four-lane elevated link road from Chennai Port to Maduravoyal project at the Chennai Port premises, recently, urged the officials to expedite the project. He had also called upon the Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami and sought his cooperation in executing the project at the earliest.
Rabindra Kumar Agarwal, Joint Secretary (Ports), Ministry of Shipping, P. Raveendran, Chairman, Cyril C. George, Deputy Chairman from Chennai Port Trust; B. Ganeshan, OSD to Mr. Radhakrishnan; Alok Deepakar, Chief General Manager, NHAI; Rear Admiral Alok Bhatnagar, from Navy; Ulaganathan, Dy. Secretary, Highways and T.A. Thilakavathi, Dy.C.E. (Planning), NH, Tamil Nadu government were among those who participated in the discussions.
