Hundreds of college students in Panchetti and employees of industries in Gummidipoondi can now heave a sigh of relief with work progressing briskly to connect the new bridge at Karanodai, albeit temporarily.
The bridge is part of the Rs.418.75-crore NHAI project to six-lane the National Highway 5, which is the road to Kolkata.
The old bridge, which is parallel to the new facility, is a major bottleneck on the Chennai-Tada route as the connecting road leading to it on either side is of six lanes width. The new bridge had been completed over a year ago and had not been connected as land acquisition was not done.
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The temporary connection has been provided following pressure from the using public. Sources said that the National Highways Authority of India has asked the contractor L&T to connect the bridge even though land acquisition is yet to be completed.
“It is a waste of money and when we get land, we will have to undo this work and do it again. But we have been getting a lot of pressure from the public and government. It would help provide relief from traffic jams,” said a source in the NHAI.
V.V.Ravi, a professor at one of the several colleges in the stretch, said that opening of the bridge would help prevent long jams.
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“There have been times when we wanted for traffic to clear for hours together and been late to college. However, even now the toll plaza does not have additional lanes a promised. Vehicles slow down considerably at the plaza too,” he said.
The project has been delayed by various factors including delay in land acquisition and change in alignment.