The Roads and Buildings department has stepped up work on completing traffic study of the southern corridor of the prestigious regional ring road project.
The department has completed traffic study relating to the northern corridor and submitted the report to the Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways. “We have received in-principle approval for the northern corridor of the project and this will be followed by notification of the corridor as national highway,” a senior official said.
Once the traffic study of the southern corridor is completed, the department will submit the same to the Union Ministry. The approval from the Ministry would be followed by declaration of the entire project stretch of 338 km as national highway. The project, a brainchild of Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, is estimated to cost around ₹ 17,000 crore with the work on the 186 km estimated to cost ₹ 10,000 crore in the first phase and the remaining 152 km in the second phase with an estimated ₹ 6,481 crore. The Central government would bear the entire project cost while the State government will have to bear half the cost of land acquisition.
Senior officials told The Hindu that the land acquisition cost itself was expected to be around ₹ 4,000 crore, of which the State had to bear ₹ 2,000 crore. Given the stress on finances faced on account of the COVID-19, the government is expected to opt for commercialisation of certain stretches of land along the regional ring road.
Identification of suitable lands for commercialisation has commenced and the government is expected to take a policy decision soon. Revision of market values of land is likely to be one among the major policy decisions in the direction.
