A project to construct a pedestrian pavements and parks along these over a 5.15 km stretch of Avanashi Road – from Anna Statue to Kalapatti Junction near the airport -- began in the city on Saturday.
Work for the nearly five ft wide pavements and a five ft wide parks along these was launched by Mayor R. Venkatachalam and Coimbatore Corporation Commissioner Anshul Mishra. Deputy Mayor N. Karthik, councillors and officials of the Corporation were present.
The Rs.6-crore project was being implemented in view of the World Classical Tamil Conference to be held in the city from June 23 to 27. It would be completed by May 31, in time for the conference, the Mayor said.
This was one of the many infrastructure projects being carried out across the city in view of the conference. Avanashi Road, one of the busy thoroughfares in the city, did not have foot path for pedestrians. They had to clash with either moving vehicles or parked ones to find space to walk.
The Mayor said a Hyderabad-based company was implementing it on a design-build-operate and transfer basis, he said.
The company would maintain the pavements and parks for three years and then hand these over to the Corporation. The civic body would decide then whether to take up the maintenance or hand it over again to a private party.