The government is looking to widen three national highway stretches in the State with the Mangalore Division of the national highways inviting bids for preparing feasibility reports.
The three roads which were State highways were upgraded as national highways sometime ago.
Their width was not uniform and hence the plan to widen them, sources in the division, under the State Public Works, Ports and Inland Water Transport, told The Hindu .
The highways identified for widening were the 78 km stretch of the NH 234 between B.C. Road in Dakshina Kannada and Kottigehara in Chikmagalur district, the 88 km stretch of the NH 169 (A) between Malpe in Udupi district and Thirthahalli in Shimoga district and the 72 km stretch of NH 73 from Moodigere to Kadur via Chikmagalur in Chikmagalur district.
Sources said that July 21, 2014 would be the last date for submitting bid proposals.
They said that it had been also proposed to widen the highways as seven metres roads (carriageway) with one metre wide paved shoulders on two sides of the highways.
Meanwhile, Nalin Kumar Kateel, MP, Dakshina Kannada said that he would meet the Union Minister for Surface Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari in Delhi either on July 7 or July 8 and urge him to widen the stretch between B.C. Road and Kottigehara as a four-lane road.
Sources in the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), Mangalore said that they were waiting for the Centre’s approval for widening the 50 km stretch between Mangalore and Karkala via Moodbidri on NH 169 even as the final feasibility report on taking up this project has been completed.
It has proposed to widen the stretch between Mangalore (from Kulashekara) and Moodbidri into a four-lane road and the stretch between Moodbidri and Karkala as two-lane road.
There has also been a proposal to widen the 20 km stretch between Moodbidri and Karkala into a two-lane road, taking into consideration that the traffic here is less than what one could witness between Mangalore and Moodbidri.
There is also a proposal to construct a bypass at Gurupur and Moodbidri under engineering procurement construction (EPC) mode of contract (under this mode of contract the government spends the entire money required to build a road).
