To cut traffic woes, e-ways put on national projects list

New Delhi: In order to meet the set deadline, the Union government has recently included Eastern and Western Peripheral Expressways in the category of “national projects” list under “Pragati II”. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Cabinet secretary P.K. Sinha will be reviewing the project every month so that they are completed on time. The project has already been delayed by several years despite it being regularly monitored by the Supreme Court.

Sources said that since the PM will himself review the project, this will ensure its timely completion. “It will instantly streamline the working on the crucial project which was somewhat lying in limbo for long. Since the monitoring of all national projects is done by the PM, the officials of the NHAI and Uttar Pradesh government are in a tizzy to fast forward this project and ensure its timely completion. The entire project has a deadline of July 2018,” said sources.

The work on the Eastern Peripheral Expressway (EPE) has already been initiated in UP. Five construction companies have been engaged in this project. The six-lane access controlled EPE, coming up at a total cost of Rs 5,673 crore, is being implemented by the National Highways Authority of India.

The EPE is one half of the peripheral road around Delhi along with the Western Peripheral (WPE) Expressway, which is being implemented by the Haryana government.

Union road and surface transport minister Nitin Gadkari has already announced that EPE would be completed within 400 days after its work is awarded to the agencies concerned.

While the Western Expressway is almost 80 per cent ready, work on the Eastern Expressway has now been fast-tracked. The start and end points of both EPE and the WPE are the same, thereby forming a ring road outside Delhi.

The two expressways — each about 135 km long — were planned in 2006 following a Supreme Court order to form a ring road outside Delhi for channelling non-Delhi-bound traffic, bypassing the national capital. With rising air pollution levels and road accidents in Delhi, the need for the two expressways was highlighted even more.

While the EPE, which envisages providing signal-free connectivity between Ghaziabad, Faridabad, Gautam Budh Nagar (Greater Noida) and Palwal, is expected to be ready by this year, the WPE connecting Kundli to Palwal via Manesar in Haryana will be ready next year.

This 135 kilometer long project will divert two lakh vehicles every day from entering into the capital and instead these vehicles will be diverted from Ghaziabad to Gautam Budh Nagar, Faridabad, and Palwal and finally towards Manesar.

The Baghpat-Ghaziabad stretch of this expressway is 24.5 km; 22 km between Ghaziabad to Gautam Budh Nagar; 21 km between Gautam Budh Nagar to Faridabad; and between Faridabad to Palwal it is 22 km.

The Eastern Expressway will be one of India’s first ever green roads, entirely lit by solar panels and using fly ash, a by-product of power generation with coal for embanking the highway.

Last year, the Delhi government had moved a plea in the Supreme Court to issue a directive for the completion of the two expressways in a time-bound manner. The Delhi government had complained that it was asked to bear 50 per cent cost of the Rs 844-crore project but that the total project cost had been revised to Rs 3,589.56 crore. It had requested the court to fix a cut-off date up to which it had to bear the land acquisition price. The Delhi government had said that they would have to bear it for 10 years. However, after committing to the project, Delhi government was bearing the brunt of the continued movement of transit traffic, its hazards and resultant pollution, as well as the repeated demands for release of additional funds for the expressways.